Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

~ Spring Break ~

"Morning, kid. It's time to get up."

Those were the first words Celina heard that morning. Said by James Barnes. Or Bucky. Or even Buckaroo, if she was in a good mood. So, Buckaroo it was, then.

"I'll be in the kitchen in a minute," she grumbled into the pillow, eyes still halfway closed. She thought he was able to hear it, as he didn't say anything else, so  Celina dragged herself out of bed, opening the blinds of the guest room she had been staying in for the past ten months. The sun was shining, but not too brightly. Celina wasn't exactly someone who enjoyed the sun literally burning her skin off, so she appreciated it.

After quickly brushing her teeth and washing her face, she grabbed the small pile of clothes from her chair, slipping into the baggy jeans and throwing over a Palaye Royale hoodie. Bucky had already been waiting in the kitchen when she walked in. "Mornin', Buckaroo."

"I told you to stop calling me that," he replied, though even Celina could hear some amusement in his tone. 

"Fine, but only because I'll be stuck with you for the rest of the day and can't escape to school," the girl teased and sat down at the breakfast table. She smiled at the pancakes on her plate. Bucky's ability to make pancakes had improved drastically, ever since Celina started living with him. He'd managed to get them from looking like shapeless heaps of batter to nearly perfect, soft circles. "Wow, you didn't burn the entire kitchen?"

Bucky rolled his eyes, but smiled and sat down on the other chair. "No, not this time." "Weird, I could've sworn I smelled smoke..." 

He just chuckled. "Eat something, alright? Today is actually going to be a bit busy, so I'll need your help." 

Oh, right. Packing. Celina had nearly forgotten that the two of them were about to move into the Avengers compound. Tomorrow, to be exact. Bucky said it's because there's more space and she'd get her own room. The thought of moving itself wasn't all too bad, but Celina wasn't sure about all the other people that she would live with, as she'd grown quite comfortable with her and Bucky's small 'family', even if it wasn't much. 

"Good, I'll help. What do I need to do?" 

"Not much, just put your things into a box. The furniture stays here." 

And that's what Celina did after breakfast. It didn't take her long to store her stuff in the cardboard box since most of the things she had taken with her from her old home were still in their packages. She took her belongings from the makeshift bedside table and paused. A piece of paper peeked out from underneath the small stack of books, so Celina carefully stored them away before picking up the photograph. She could feel her throat starting to burn slightly and felt her eyes get wet as she stared at her own face, probably not older than eight years, between her parents. Despite being in a much better situation now, there were still moments where she missed them, where her brain ignored the bad memories simply for the sake of nostalgia. Fucking hell, Celina hated her head sometimes.

She quickly wiped her tears and continued packing, leaving the miserable piece of paper on the windowsill. Celina couldn't decide whether she should keep it to remember, or throw it away to move on. Only a few minutes later, she looked around the room. It looked empty, like a piece of lineart the artist forgot to color. She carried the boxes into the hallway, using the permanent marker to write her name onto them. 

"Hey, Bucky?"

"What's up, kid?"

"What are we gonna do for the rest of the day?"

Bucky got off the couch and walked over. "Well, we could go for a little tour on the bike, maybe to a park. The weather's nice."

Celina nodded. "Sounds nice."

~

The engine of the bike was roaring as they rode down the highway. The air was hitting Celina's face as she held onto Bucky's waist. Fuck, how she loved these moments of comfortable silence.

~

That evening, Celina sat down on her bed. Not very spectacular, she knew that. But as she sat there, looking at the sunset outside the window, her thoughts started spiraling. She was moving tomorrow, to live with the Avengers, for fuck's sake. She wasn't sure what to expect, living with a bunch of superheroes. Being honest to herself, she admitted that she was scared. What if they thought she was weird? That sounded corny and Celina knew that. But it was a possibility. What if they only tolerated her? What if her whole life would go back to how it had been before? What if...

knock knock

"Y-yeah?"

The door opened and Bucky walked in, sitting down next to the crying girl, but she remained silent, not even bothering to wipe away the tears that have started running down her cheeks as she overthought the next day. He didn't say anything at first, just wrapped his arm around Celina and she leaned her head against his shoulder, crying quietly. Why did she always have to think of the worst scenarios possible? 

Celina slowly calmed down as the man gently caressed her arm. "What's wrong, doll?"

"Just..." she choked out, "just overthinking again... What do you think they'll think about me...?"

Bucky sighed. "Kid, there's no need to worry. You're amazing. I'm sure they'll like you, you're smart. And honestly? You remind me of Steve sometimes. Well, if you ignore the dumb shit he always used to do, getting into fights he wouldn't have survived without help. I'm glad you don't do that."

That made Celina smile a little. She liked it when he told her about his memories. It made him smile too. The two of them stayed quiet for another while and she managed to calm down eventually. "Thanks, Bucky..."

"No problem, kid. It's what I'm here for, isn't it?" Celina scrunched up her nose when Bucky ruffled her hair. He really was getting comfortable with the dad-role. "You know what? I'll let you pick the music for the car ride tomorrow."

She smirked at that, already planning what to play. "Great. I'll try my best to find something worthy of our entrance."

Bucky raised his eyebrows and the kid just grinned like a little shit. She could practically see the fear in his eyes, he knew Celina would absolutely use that opportunity to make an entrance. 

"Alright, goodnight, you little punk. You need your beauty sleep."

And that's how Celina ended up in a car with James Buchanan Barnes, blasting the Hamilton soundtrack as they drove up to the Avengers Headquarters. As soon as she saw the building, the car window was open, the volume turned up all the way just to see Bucky cringe, trying to disappear in his seat. 

The car came to a halt and the music stopped.

"Aw man... it was just getting to the best part.." Celina sighed in disappointment, to what Bucky only rolled his eyes. 

"Celina, you've had your 'entrance', they know you're a theatre kid."

She smiled smugly and the two of them stepped out of the vehicle, facing the waiting Avengers. Well, a selection of them. Tony Stark was there, of course, as well as the falcon. Celina let her gaze travel over the relatively small assembly as Sam and Bucky shared a suspiciously long hug. 

"Hamilton, huh?"

The comment came from Hawkeye, who stood there with a smirk and crossed arms. She just nodded and mirrored the smirk. "You bet your ass it was."

He nodded and looked over to Bucky. "You raised the kid right, Bucket. Very good taste." Then he turned to said kid and held out a hand. "The name's Clint." Celina took his hand and nodded. "Celina. Or just Lina or any variation or short version of it that fits the mood."

Bucky interrupted their conversation by clearing his throat. "Alright, Barton, we gotta get our things inside. Would you be so nice and show us where they are?" 

Clint nodded, patted his shoulder and grabbed some of Celina's boxes. "Sure."

The bunch of them made their way through the maze of a compound, somehow ending up in the dorm area. They paused in front of a white, blank door with a small sign next to it. It read "C. Barnes"

"Stark already started furnishing a little, but in case you want something else, just ask him. He's got enough money." Clint nodded towards the door. "Go ahead, that's your room now."

Celina pushed open the door and once she got a good look of the room, her jaw dropped. "Is that a fucking record player? How the hell did he know I've wanted one for ages??"

Bucky chuckled and patted her shoulder. "He asked me if there's anything he could add to your room, what the furniture should look like. I thought you might prefer the darker tones, not the usual white Ikea furniture."

Celina smiled at him and carried her boxes inside. "Thanks, Buck. Really." "No problem, kid. I'll go find my own room, you'll be okay, right?"

She nodded and sat down on the bed. White bed sheets, black duvet, black pillow. Celina took another look around, analiyzing the room. It looked nice.

Maybe... Maybe living here from now on wouldn't be so bad.

Chapter Text

Later that day, after emptying her boxes and moving the contents to their new places, Celina had gotten used to her new room. She thought about putting some pictures and posters onto the walls later, making herself comfortable in a way, but for now she had promised Bucky to meet him outside to meet some of the other Avengers. She gave herself a quick once-over in the mirror, smiling at the way her chocolate brown hair ended right above her shoulders, gently curving up at the ends. She adjusted the flannel she was wearing, pulled her necklaces out from underneath her shirt and took another small breath before stepping out onto the hallway again.

"Hey, kid. There you are." Apparently, Bucky had already been waiting for Celina. "Most of the others are in the lounge, come on. Steve's on a mission with Natasha for today, but you'll meet the rest."

Celina nodded and followed him through the compound, only hoping he'd know where to go. This place was a fucking maze... Though they made it to the lounge eventually. He pushed the door open and let her enter first.

"Woah-"

Celina looked up from the ground and saw a brunette boy, probably a bit older than her, looking at her with his mouth slightly agape. Why the hell would he look at her like that. 

"Parker, stop drooling over every slightly alt chick you see, it's pathetic, man."

That was a boy the same age, this time with sandy blonde hair. The boy from before blushed in embarassment and looked away, muttering something illegible. Celina chuckled to herself but remained quiet otherwise, waiting for someone else to start the introduction.

"Alright, calm down boys, that's my child you're talking about." Celina smiled. She liked it when Bucky called her his kid. It made her feel... like she belonged somewhere.

The blonde boy raised his hands defensively, quickly apologising to Bucky before turning to Celina. "Hiya, I'm Harley, the guy over there's Peter. And you are...?"

"Celina," she replied. "Or Lina, whatever you want." Harley nodded, seemingly memorizing his options. "Cool, man." Tony then spoke up.

"Listen, Courtney Love junior, you're moving into my building, I have rules here." Celina nodded. "Of course."

"There might be no rules that say when you have to go to bed, but unless you can work on two hours of sleep and in case you value your beauty sleep, you shouldn't sleep to late. Our resident star spangled man will wake you up forcefully if you don't get up before seven. He lets you sleep in on weekends, but prepare for the judgemental stares. Saturday is our teambuilding day, whether that's inside the tower or not, and Sunday is for our weekly clean-up. We pick teams for the chores, but you and Terminator 2 will be excluded for the first week you're here-" "I usually do the dishes!"

The last comment came from a guy sitting in an armchair with a book on his lap. Celina recognised him, as he visited Bucky once in their old apartment, so she smiled and waved. "Hey, Bob!" He replied silently with a returned wave, going back to his book.

"Anyway," Tony continued with a sigh after being interrupted by Bob, "Parker and Keener will show you around the building in a minute. I'll be in the lab, in case one of you needs me." With that, he left towards the hallway, presumably entering the elevator, and the two boys looked at each other before turning towards Celina. 

"H-hey..." Peter started with a slight stutter. "So, um... just to make sure... what are your pronouns...?"

Celina raised her eyebrows in slight, yet pleasant surprise. "Well, I'm used to she/her, but to be honest, I don't really care, as long as I know you're talking about me. Kind of in a 'what the fuck is gender even?' way." 

Harley snorted out a laugh. "Yeah, you did kinda give me those non-binary lesbian vibes– ow!" Peter had elbowed him in the ribs. "That's rude, man!" he muttered. The girl just shrugged it off. "Rather that than having others think I'm homophobic or something." 

After a short conversation, she looked over at Bucky, who just gave her an encouraging nod, so Peter, Harley and Celina went off to check out the compound. 

"So, you know the living area already," Harley started explaining. "There's private offices on the top floor, but unless you have your own, access is prohibited. The meeting rooms are in the building over there–" Peter pointed out of the window "–but you only need those if you're an Avenger, which you and me, my love, are not." Harley sighed in exaggerated disappointment. 

"You can access the training area, though!" Peter threw in. "We got a normal gym and a shooting range, but you need an adult for that one."

Celina nodded and they started a small tour across the entire headquarters, eventually ending up back in the dormitory area. 

"Ya know, I think we should give you a quick tour of this area too." Harley leaned against the wall next to Celina's bedroom door. "Pete's room is right next to yours, mine is one further." 

She followed his description and checked the small signs on the doors. Then she paused when she read the one on the other side of her own door. "...why does that one say 'Peter 3'...? How many Peters are there?"

"Oh, that..." the Peter next to Celina began. "Well, a while ago there was a bit of a... multiversal chaos. A bunch of villains from other universes got to ours. And two other Spider-men. We managed to get the other one back safely, but when we closed the other dimensions, this one's universe got out of control and he couldn't go back. I managed to get Mr. Stark to let him live here with us."

That... was not what she had expected. At all. To say she was taken aback would have been quite the understatement. "Wait. What do you mean by 'we'? Who else?"

"Oh, um... I meant myself and Doctor Strange. He did most of it, actually." Peter hastily explained. "So... do you wanna go around and just introduce yourself to the others...?" Celina simply nodded, still trying to get over the fact that, apparently, a whole other universe had collapsed. "Yeah, sure."

So the girl knocked. It didn't take long before the door opened and a young man, probably in college, with messy brown hair and a very tired-looking smile leaned against the frame, arms crossed in front of his chest. "Well, hello," he greeted. "Hi," Celina waved back, looking up at him after catching a glimpse of the inside of his room. The walls were decorated with a lot of science posters, but every now and then she could make out a band name. "I just... well, I moved into the room next to you and just wanted to say hi, I guess. I'm Celina."

"Well," he gestured towards the sign next to his door, "I'm Peter, as you can see. Nice to meet you." Celina smiled to herself, thinking that he seemed friendly enough. "If there's anything else you need, I'll be in here. I'm working on something right now, I'm just... gonna go back inside, alright?"

She nodded and waited for him to close the door before turning back to Peter 1 and Harley. The latter looked at her with raised eyebrows. "Y'all are not exactly the biggest conversationalists, huh?" "Well, we said what needed to be said, didn't we?" Celina retorted, to which he defensively raised his hands. "Alright, alright, I got it."

The two boys then walked her around the hallway, quickly showing her where everyone's room was, which was a little unnecessary, if you were to ask Celina herself, since their names were written onto the doors.

"So... what's next?" She asked when they were done, awkwardly sticking her hands into her front pockets. The were way too small and she only managed to fit the top of her fingers in there. To whoever decided women didn't need actual pockets in their pants: Fuck you, man.

"Well, we could just hang out for a bit, lunch is at 1 PM." Peter suggested before his eyes lit up "Oh, wait! I wanna see your room!" Celina shrugged and nodded. "Sure, why not? It's not exactly finished yet, though."

"Well, obviously, you just moved in," Harley snorted. "But I'm sure you have some visions, don't ya?"

"If by 'having visions' you mean scrolling on pinterest for hours and never making actual plans, then I do." 

The boys followed Celina into her room and she closed the door behind them. Harley immediately plopped down on the bed—incredibly rude action, if Celina may add—while Peter awkwardly remained standing in the middle of the room, so the girl pulled out the chair in front of the desk, gesturing for him to sit. He smiled and muttered a quick "thanks" as he sat down, adjusting his shirt by giving it a tug away from his body. 

Celina took a seat beside the bed, leaning back against it. She instantly realized how big of a mistake that was. To be precise, the realization came when she felt a small pain on her scalp. And then another one. After ignoring it three times, she swatted away Harley's hand, stopping him from pulling on her hair. "Sorry, sorry, I'll stop," he apologized between giggles before stopping abruptly. "Hey... is that a guitar?"

"No, it's a drum kit." Celina replied sarcastically, then looked over at the guitar case in the corner of the room. "Of course it's a guitar." That earned her another tug on her hair.

"How long have you been playing?" Peter asked, looking up from his hands.

"I started in fifth grade," she answered, "so that's about 3 years."

"Damn-!" 

"What?" Celina looked up at Harley with a raised eyebrow. He stared back at her, jaw slightly dropped and his hand immediately pulled away from herhair. "That means you're in eighth grade?!" She just nodded. "You're in middle school?!" She nodded again. "I thought you were sixteen at least!"

That surprised her a little. Well, yeah, people have thought she looked older than her age before, but two whole years? "Well... I'm not... I'm fourteen," Celina awkardly said.

"Yeah, right.... sorry for that reaction, I guess." 

An awkward silence followed and she was sure it lasted several minutes. Her eyes had started trailing across the empty walls when Peter broke it. "So... what kind of music do you play?"

Chapter Text

The first week at the compound passed without complications. Most of the Avengers had a pretty strict training schedule, meaning that Celina had had to keep herself busy by herself. Harley and Peter had nothing to do either, since they’d graduated High-school last year and were taking a break for a year.

So this past week, Celina spent most of her time with the two Peter Parkers (Both had excellent musical taste in her opinion), Harley, and Bob. They used to sit in the lounge, quietly playing music on one of their phones (Tony granted only very few chosen people access to the speakers throughout the building and neither of them were chosen) and either doing something by themselves or playing games. Every now and then they went to one of their rooms, using the PS5 in Peter 1’s room or planning out design-ideas in Celina’s still pretty bland room.

By the end of the week, they had created a list of things to get for decoration. “And what posters do you want exactly? ‘Video games’ doesn’t really say a lot,” Harley asked as he skimmed over the list again. Celina shrugged, thinking about what she’d played or watched in the past. “I’ll make a separate list for that, I've got a few ideas already, I think.” “Really?” Bob asked, looking up from the sleeves he’d been playing with. “Like what?” Celina took a small breath and started thinking out loud. “Well, I might have had a slight hyperfixation on Hamilton lately, so that. For video games, Sally Face–” “YOU KNOW SALLY FACE?!” Everyone, really, everyone in the room jumped at Peter 1’s excited yelling. “Yeah…?” Celina replied carefully. And that seemed to trigger something in him. His face lit up, his brain seemingly working too fast for his mouth to keep up. Harley had to slap his arm pretty hard for him to slow down and collect his thoughts. He took a deep breath and started with one question.

“So… who’s your favorite character? Wait, let me guess… either Ash or Larry?” Celina nodded. “Yeah, one of them, I think. Probably Larry, though.” “Yeah, that fits you,” Peter mused, as if she had given him the answer to a very philosophical question. He then went on a small ramble as to why he loved the game so much. It took him some time, but he managed to calm down in the end. Celina noticed that when he took a deep breath, he pulled his shirt away from his chest to loosen it up. She’d noticed he did that quite a lot.

Peter 3, who’d been quiet the entire time, now spoke up: “So… any other ideas for posters?” Celina tilted her head in thought. “Well… probably something Zelda related, or Lord of the rings. I got a bunch of bands I like… Comics too.” “What comics?” Bob asked. Celina remembered he liked to read comics as well. “Oh, you know, DC. Mostly Batman related, nothing too niche.” Harley gasped, looking absolutely outraged as he shouted: “Traitor!” “My sincerest apologies, Mr Keener. If there’s anything I can do to make up for my utterly horrific mistakes, let me know.” He only laughed in response.

“Who’s your favorite character?” Bob asked, leaning forward a little. Celina shrugged (once again) “Well, I like all that bat family stuff, I think it’s one of them. Jason or Tim.” There she was most definitely under exaggerating. If she had been honest, that would have meant admitting her slight obsession with Jason Todd and his story. Bob just smiled and nodded approvingly.

Just then, Peter 1 chimed in: “Tomorrow is game night with the other Avengers, by the way. We usually play things like Uno or Monopoly, but you don’t have to play all the games, as long as you’re there.” His eyes raked across the room and stopped on the guitar that had been taken out of its case and placed on a stand by now. “Hey, would you wanna play something on the guitar? We could have a little campfire singing session! Well, without the campfire of course.” Celina thought for a moment before nodding. “Alright, why not? As long as I don’t have to sing alone, sure. I’ll pick a few songs then.” The other Peter smiled too. “Sounds like a good idea.”

After a few minutes they spent scrolling on Pinterest to find poster ideas, the younger Spider-man spoke up again. “So… about the pride flag… is there a specific one you want or are you going with the classic rainbow?” Celina thought about it for a moment before she answered: “Well, I think I’ll stay with the classic rainbow until I find a label for myself. If I do. But so far I’ve got no clue.” He nodded thoughtfully, in an almost approving way. “Good plan..”

They spent the rest of the afternoon creating somewhat of a setlist to make sure Celina could prepare for the evening and didn’t have to start playing on the spot, raw, no protection. Peter 1 smiled a suspiciously wide yet subtle smile when Celina added a Cavetown song, but she chose to ignore that.

The rest of the afternoon, they just hang around and judge each others’ musical tastes– turns out Celina was pretty much a mix of all of them, so she’d have the least problems if anyone played some of their music. At some point, Bob got up and just placed Celina’s guitar in her lap without a comment. “...what exactly do you want me to do…?” “Why don’t you play a little? We can be your practice audience,” Bob said as he plopped down on the small pile of pillows he’d built himself. “So… do you just want me to go through the list or…?” “Yep.”

Celina sighed and pressed play. The first song was Snow Patrol’s “Run”, so Celina simply strummed the chords along to the music. They weren’t complicated, at least that was how she felt about them after a few years of practice. No fancy strumming patterns, no finger picking, so she played and hummed along quietly.

After a few songs, she was playing “Hey There Delilah” at the time, the door opened just an inch and Bucky peeked inside. He stood there for a while, just observing the small group with a smile. It was an odd mix—a grown ass man, a young adult, two late teens and a fourteen-year-old—yet they got along incredibly well. He chuckled fondly and closed the door as silently as he opened it.

Around 7 PM the group made their way into the kitchen where Steve had prepared dinner. Well, he tried his best and they ended up eating spaghetti with pesto. At least the pasta was somewhat al dente, so no one complained. Except Tony. The man went on a rant about Steve disrespecting Italian culture, using creative insults in both English and Italian, which—despite taking Italian classes for over half a year—Celina did not understand at all. She decided to practice her vocabulary more from that moment on.

***

Saturday– 6 AM

Celina had set an alarm for the mornings to establish a more organized routine. The high-pitched beeping of the clock ripped her out of her sleep, making her groan in tired annoyance. Celina reached over to her bedside table to turn the aggravating noise off before she realized she had placed the clock across the room a night ago so she couldn’t hit snooze from her lying position. She sat up with a jump to wake her body up and nearly fell over when she tried to get up. Holding onto the bed frame, she managed to steady herself before finally walking over to turn off the demonic voice of the alarm. Finally some quiet.

Celina put on sweatpants and a sports bra before tying up her hair and entering the bathroom. She chuckled as she looked into the mirror. With my hair tied up, I literally look like a boy. She brushed her teeth, washed her face and put on her thin-rimmed glasses, then grabbed her water bottle to fill for a small workout.

Celina made her way through the maze they called their headquarters, trying her best to remember the tour Pete and Harley had given her on her first day. The gym was seemingly empty, so Celina went ahead and stretched before stepping onto the treadmill.

About an hour later, the workout was done, Celina was sweating waterfalls and her muscles hurt like hell, but how could she have given up when she had Lin-Manuel Miranda and Leslie Odom Jr. rapping into her ears?

By now, Steve had entered the gym as well, attacking the punching bags. Once Celina had taken a seat on the bench to take a breath, the Captain walked over to join her. “You’ve got a good form, son.” Son, she thought, not sure whether to try and suppress the urge to say ‘Call me son ONE MORE TIME-’ or think about the odd feeling she had when Steve called her that. It was probably an accident, but that did not change the fact it had felt… good…

“Oh, um… Thanks, Cap.” He smiled and shook his head. “Just say Steve, Sam’s the captain now. I still fight, yes, but just as Steve.” Celina smiled at that, nodding as a sign that she’d remember that. “Alright. Thanks Steve.” The man smiled and stood up again, walking back to the punching bags. Before he left entirely, he turned around once again. “You did a good job, kid. And sorry for calling you son, it’s just an old habit of mine from the army.” Celina waved it off dismissively. “It’s not a problem, really. Keep going if you want to, I don’t really care all that much.” “Got it, son–” “Call me son ONE MORE TIME–”

Steve Rogers cracked up. He didn’t just chuckle a little, no. It was full-blown laughter that had him bending over and clutching his stomach. That was not what Celina had expected at all. It took him a while to calm down again. He managed to do so and let out a sigh. “Hamilton, huh?”

Celina stood there for a moment, perplexed and nearly concerned. “Y-yeah, Hamilton. Are you… are you okay…?” He just nodded and smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m alright. I was just not expecting you to quote Hamilton there. You’ve got good taste, Celina.” The girl smiled, knowing she had someone to joke about Hamilton references now.

That was when she realized something. Steven Grant Rogers was a theater kid. THE star-spangled man with a plan was a fucking theater kid. It all made sense. She knew he’d had to do stage performances in a costume before actually fighting in the war, but she didn’t know it went that far. Her small smile turned into a mischievous grin. She had the perfect black-mail material now. Luckily, Steve didn’t see that grin, though, since he’d already started torturing the punching bag again.

***

The rest of the day passed without any major events. Celina read quite a lot, she still had to finish a book for school until the end of the break. Natasha and Wanda looked at the title with approval, Clint was shocked that an eighth-grader chose to read “The Handmaid’s Tale” for an English assignment. Celina just shrugged it off and kept reading.

The afternoon came and the team started to prepare the games. They had everything from Uno over Monopoly to Phase 10. Wanda made snacks and Celina was happy to help, cutting up vegetables and fruit to arrange them on a plate with dips. Wanda focused on the sweeter things like cinnamon rolls. The younger Peter Parker was walking around them, constantly asking for mozzarella sticks. Under sighs, the girls made those too.

A few more people who didn’t usually live at the tower came to join as well. Thor brought his brother, Sam brought Joaquin Torres, and Clint took Kate Bishop with him, who dragged Nat’s sister Yelena along.

It was fun to watch, honestly. Half of the people were just standing in the lounge without any idea what to do. They might as well have been literal NPCs, if Celina thought about it. She ended up carrying about seventy percent of the snacks, which was not the best idea, considering they nearly fell three times, but Celina managed to place them all on the coffee table in the middle of the conversation pit.

“Kid, you really shouldn’t have carried all of that at once,” Bucky sighed and began to spread some of the snacks over the surface. “It’s not like anything fell, I don’t see the issue.” Celina grinned and rearranged Bucky’s snack placements. The man gave her an insulted look. She just smiled and placed the dips in the middle of the whole thing.

“If i may add… this new placement does look a little better than before,” a voice behind Celina said. A hand rested on her shower and she turned around to see Loki, of all people. He shot a little grin over to Bucky, just to mock him. “So…” Loki began, turning back to Celina, “you are the new… resident, hm? What’s your name?” Celina placed the last bowl on the table and turned around. “It’s Celina.”

“Pretty name, Celina.” Loki smiled and sauntered over to the bar, pouring himself a drink. Celina frowned at the sudden end of conversation but shrugged it off. She sat down on one of the couches, leaning back. Soon, the two Spider-men sat down on either side of her and leaned against her. The younger one rested his head on her shoulder, the other one had a sketch book in his hands. He seemed to be very invested in his drawing.

Peter 1 then spoke up: “Someone should play some music, I feel understimulated.” Celina laughed and nodded. “Definitely. I’d do it, but I’m not privileged enough for that yet.” Just then, Natasha waltzed over and ruffled both of their hair. “You need music privileges? Why didn’t you just ask?” She grinned and pulled out her phone. “Any specific wishes?” The two of them just stared at her. “You… he gave you access to the speakers?” Peter asked, full of respect. “To be honest,” Celina threw in, “he was probably scared of what would happen if he didn’t do it.” Natasha snorted and gave them an expectant look. “Well?”

“Can I send you a playlist?” Celina asked, taking out her own phone. Nat shrugged. “Sure, but I’ll check it first to see if it’s good.” Celina nodded and quickly sent Nat the link, who scrolled through quickly before giving a nod of approval. “Nice mix you got there, Lina.” Celina smiled proudly and gave her a high-five when she started the music.

One by one, the others started sitting down in the pit with them, grabbing a snack every now and then. After a while of catching up with each other, Joaquin slammed the Uno cards onto the table, which wasn’t even an exaggeration, as it made the bowls shake. Though they had to use two packs to have enough cards for the whole team. Celina managed to win the first round, while Sam was still holding about twenty cards. A few rounds later, the motivation to play started to shrink and Joaquin packed them again, if only with a pout. Harley spoke up with a shiteating grin. “Hey, Celina! How about you play now? We just finished the game.”

Celina sighed, knowing it had only been a matter of time until one of them would ask her about it. “Yeah, alright, I’ll go get her.” She stood up, leaving behind two disappointed Peters, and walked out to get the guitar. “Her?” Steve asked. Bucky answered the question with a fond smile. “She’s very attached to her guitar, I’m surprised she hasn’t given that thing a name yet.”

Celina returned a few moments later, guitar case in hand. “So… I made this list of songs I can confidently play in front of people, it’s, like, 46 minutes in total. And no, I’m not going to sing alone.” She sat down in her original spot once again, wrapping the rainbow-colored guitar strap around her torso. Bob opened the list and looked over it.

“How about we start with… ‘Hey There Delilah’? I think everyone should know that one.” The majority of them nodded (if you were to ignore Loki’s “You genuinely expect me to stoop to this level?”) so Celina began to play. She was nervous and her heart was beating a little faster than usual, since she wasn’t exactly used to playing in front of people, especially not people she barely knew.

They got through the song pretty easily and went through the rest of the list. Some songs, not a single one of them needed to look up the lyrics to. The more songs Celina played, the more people took out their phones to be able to sing along, until eventually it was only Peter 1 and Celina herself who were able to sing Cavetown’s “This is Home” without ‘cheating’.

When she got to the bridge, she noticed how the boy started to sing a little more quietly and she looked over to see a tiny… tear? Celina smiled gently and finished the song before leaning in closer. “Hey, are you okay?” She tried to keep her voice quiet and at least somewhat gentle as she placed her hand on Peter’s shoulder. He just nodded. “Mhm… the song just makes me… well, emotional, I guess. Don’t worry about it.” Celina frowned with doubt, making him sigh. “Can we talk about it later? I don’t really wanna have deeptalks in front of the team.” Celina nodded in understanding and made a mental note to speak about it later.

As soon as they stopped talking, Celina started blushing from being bombarded with questions about how long she’s been playing, why she started, if she’s self-taught, etc. That was definitely too much attention for the poor girl who nearly had a mental breakdown right then and there.

She smiled her way through the interview until the questions started to lessen and the team started preparing a game of monopoly. Neither the Peters nor Celina were big fans of the game, so she took the chance to bring her guitar back into her room. Peter 1 followed her, apparently he wanted to use the opportunity to talk about their earlier situation.

The door closed behind them and Celina placed her guitar on the stand. “So… about earlier…” Celina turned towards the other boy. “Yeah?” Peter looked over to the bed. “Can we sit down?” His voice was quiet, nervous, as he gestured towards the bed. Celina nodded and the two sat down together. “So… what was going on there?” Peter was fidgeting with his hands, not wanting to look up yet.

“I… wanted to tell you eventually and I knew you were safe to talk to about this because you’re pretty obviously part of the community too, but I was still worried because coming out is always pretty emotional for me and then you played that Cavetown song and I realized how much I relate to the message, but I didn’t want to just say everything in front of everyone because what if some of them didn’t like the truth?–” Peter took a deep breath after using up all the air in his little ramble.

Celina’s eyes widened a little at the amount of words that came out of his mouth. “So… you’re saying you’re trans?” Peter nodded and sighed in relief. “Yeah. Tony knows. Of course he does, he’s paying for the transitioning. Other than that, Harley and Bob know. Joaquin too, and I think Nat and Wanda have figured it out too. Well, and of course the other Peter. The others probably just assume I’m a regular guy.” This Peter lifted his feet onto the edge of the bed and hugged his knees.

“Thanks for listening to me, though. I tend to talk a lot at once, sometimes it feels like people just pretend to listen so I’ll finish.” Celina’s eyebrows went up slightly at that statement but she added a smile to that. “Well, I did listen. Was a bit difficult to follow you sometimes, but that can also just be my poor English skill. Thanks for telling me, though.”

Peter returned the smile and opened his arms expectantly. A hug, Celina thought and wrapped her arms around him. She found it nice they could already communicate wordlessly, even if it’s only been a week they’ve known each other.

“Is that why you always tug on your shirt like that?” Peter paused. “You noticed that?” Celina nodded with a corner of her mouth raised awkwardly. Peter sighed. “Well, even when I’m wearing a binder, it still feels like they’re too visible sometimes.” Celina nodded in sympathy and went back into the hug.

***

The two of them joined the team again after another moment in silence. They nearly regretted it when they opened the door and a full-blown monopoly argument exploded into their faces. The teens looked at each other, their expressions clearly supposed to be read as a surprised Damn! They carefully walked past the conversation pit, not wanting to be involved in the team’s heated argument about whether or not Tony had snuck a few bills into his rapidly growing pile of money.

Celina and Peter 1 joined the other Spider-man in a more quiet corner under a speaker, being able to clearly hear the music she had picked so carefully. Everybody Want To Rule The World was currently playing and Celina absentmindedly sung along under her breath.

“That doesn’t even sound so bad, I don’t know why you were so adamant about not singing alone,” Peter 3 commented, the corners of his mouth turning up ever so slightly. Celina returned his smile gratefully before shaking her head lightly. “Doesn’t sound as good when I sing loud enough for everyone else to hear.” He only shrugged and muttered a small “if you say so” before returning to his sketchbook.

The small group sat in silence for a while, doing their own thing each, until Tony’s yell brutally ripped them out of their peace. “Ha! You’re all bankrupt! Guess that makes me the winner~” And immediately, Sam started arguing again, using the same old arguments.

“We should all watch a movie,” the younger Peter suggested and put his phone away. Nearly every single person in the room turned towards them at that. “Got any ideas, Underoos?” Tony asked as he let the other players put the monopoly board away. “And do not say Star Wars, we already watched that the last few times.” Celina thought for a moment before asking: “What kind of movies do you usually watch on movie nights?” After her question was answered—they’d watch anything from horror to romcoms, even though some might hate their choices—she suggested two movies. “I’m kinda in the mood for either Shutter Island or Perfume. Well, the full title is ‘Perfume: Story of a murderer’.”

That started a quiet conversation of murmurs and they settled on the latter, because nearly none of them had watched it before. Celina took note of the fact that Natasha appeared to know and like the movie. Soon, the group had built a cozy hill of pillows and blankets in the conversation pit and set up the movie on Netflix.

They dimmed the lights to a point where the only source of light might as well have been a few candles, which added to the comfortable atmosphere. Once again, Celina found herself sitting between the two Parkers, but she smiled when she saw a dark haired figure cuddled up to Bob. If she remembered correctly, that must have been Joaquin. She had to admit, the two of them were fucking adorable together.

The movie started and the whispered conversations died down. The dark atmosphere of 18th-century France filled the lounge, the lingering topic of death resting in the back of their minds as they watched the screen. Having watched the movie before, Celina tried to focus on as many details as she could, trying her best to pay attention to what she saw.

She was so focused, she barely noticed the younger Spidey starting to yawn. As the movie progressed, he got to a point where there were only very few moments in which his mouth was actually closed, and Celina started to worry about all the flies that might accidentally get lost in there.

During a concerningly long yawn, she simply reached over and closed his jaw with her hand, which earned her an insulted “Hey!” and a barely threatening glare. Celina chuckled and pulled him closer without thinking about it. But Peter didn’t seem to mind as he rested his head on her shoulder. About an hour into the movie, his head started to drop every now and then, until he fully fell asleep after half of the movie. Celina just smiled quietly until she remembered something. Her heartbeat picked up in concern and she gently shook the boy awake again. He rubbed his eyes groggily and looked up at her.

“What-?”

“Did you take off your binder?" Celina asked in a rushed whisper just to see the boy's eyes widen. He quickly reached under his shirt and let out a relieved sigh once he opened his binder, which luckily had a zipper in the front. The boy calmed down again and leaned back against Celina. She was glad she could help the boy not to die from suffocation.

Even though the plot of the movie was quite absurd, Celina started to get tired as well and ended up having to force her eyes to stay open. The movie came to an end, and Peter woke up again. As he stretched—his movements resembling those of a cat in an almost uncanny way—she smiled to herself, wondering how the hell she managed to find this boy.

Chapter Text

Sunday morning

Some of last night’s guests—mainly the ones that had fallen asleep during the movie—had decided to just stay asleep in the lounge, since it was already pretty comfortable and no one had the energy to go back to their room. 

The sun started shining through the large windows, right into Celina’s face. It might have been a romantic image if it hadn’t meant her nearly going blind from that goddamn fireball with main character syndrome. Celina groaned and checked her watch to see it was barely 7 AM. Her second groan, combined with her movements, caused Peter 1 to stir awake slowly. He did not move from the spot he had fallen asleep last night.

Celina closed her eyes for another moment to relax a bit more, but that attempt at peace was destroyed by a certain god of thunder, who shook her shoulder with a quite tight grip. The girl sighed and opened her eyes again. 

“Rise and shine, new warrior!” the big blonde exclaimed with a bright expression on his face. “Tony wants to speak with you!” Before she could say anything, Thor had already pulled her up with his disgusting strength. “He is waiting for you in the kitchen.”

Celina wriggled out of his grip and yawned. “Alright, alright, I’ll go see what he wants.” She stretched one last time before walking through the hallway. What the hell could Tony want from me at SEVEN IN THE MORNING? was all that Celina’s tired brain managed to think as she dragged her legs into the kitchen. 

“Morning, doll,” Bucky greeted and ruffled her hair. “How’d you sleep? I hope your arm didn’t fall off with that spider-boy sleeping on it.” He went ahead and rubbed her arm gently, which, to Celina’s surprise, wasn’t as unpleasant as expected. She usually hated being touched so randomly…

Shaking that thought off, Celina shrugged. “I slept well, I s’pose. It wasn’t bad at least. And yes, my arm still works.” Bucky chuckled and went to continue making coffee. He turned his head to look at her over his shoulder. “You should go talk to Stark, he wants to tell you something.” The girl nodded and searched the kitchen. 

Then she spotted him, sitting at the dining table while looking more well-rested than usual. Probably because the movie stopped him from staying in his lab all night. “Morning, Frances Bean Cobain. I heard you picked the music last night?”, Tony asked with a smirk and raised eyebrow. “Did Nat tell you?”, Celina asked as she sat down with him, resting her chin on the arm she placed on the table. “Doesn’t matter who told me, but yes. So… I gotta say, it wasn’t as bad as I would have expected it from a… how old are you again?”

“Fourteen.” “Right, from a fourteen-year-old. Considering there’s a bunch of people in this building who have questionable tastes, I got Friday to only let specific people access the sound system.” Celina nodded, already knowing that but not wanting to seem rude. She had a suspicion where this was going… “Well, kid, I decided your music is decent enough. Feel honored, you can play music now.”

Celina’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “Really?” The billionaire only nodded and got up. “Yes. And don’t abuse it, I’m the one paying for your housing.”

Celina just continued to sit at the table, smiling. She’d done it. She’d managed to get Tony’s approval. That meant endless possibilities. She decided to give it a try. “Friday?”

“Yes, Miss Barnes?” the feminine voice of the AI replied. “Could you…” She took a moment to think of something. “Could you play the Meteora album? By Linkin Park” “Of course. Would you like it from the start or from a specific point?” Celina smiled. “From the start please.”

Bucky sat down next to his adopted daughter, sliding a plate with scrambled eggs and avocado over the table. “Here, eat.” Celina didn’t mind the lack of conversation, she knew there’s days he wasn’t very vocal. She flashed him a smile and muttered a quick thank you before beginning to eat. It tasted pretty good, actually. “Did you make that?”

He gave her a lock of mock-offence. “Are you questioning my cooking skill? How rude.” “What? No, I’d never.”  Celina chuckled and went back to her plate, so the two of them just sat in silence for a while, peacefully eating their eggs. 

Bob and the two Spider-men walked in after a while, all three of them still looking quite tired. For once, they didn’t sit down next to her but on the other side of the table. The younger Spidey grabbed some toast but didn’t bother putting much effort into it. “Damn, dry bread?” Harley laughed as he entered as well. Bread. That triggered something in Celina and Bob seemed to notice, smirking at Harley. 

“Bold move, man. Calling toast ‘bread’ in front of the German. You got a death wish?”, he joked and turned towards Celina. “Who did you convince to play the music, by the way?” She smiled with an almost smug look on her face. “I didn’t need to convince anyone.”

“Wait…” Harley’s face lit up with glee. “Stark gave you access?! You can play music now! Congratulations!” He jumped up again, making everyone at the table jump and causing Bucky to groan tiredly. “We have to celebrate! One of our people reached a higher rank in the team, that is something remarkable. It’s the last day of spring break, and we will use this last day to celebrate our new queen!” 

Celina sighed, cringing at the last word. “I think ‘queen’ is a bit much. I’m not ready for being royalty yet. If we’re going with medieval terms, I think ‘bard’ would be much better.” Bob and the older Peter nodded. “That would fit a lot better, that’s true.” She smiled and finally finished her eggs. “I guess I’m the bard of the group then.” 

“Alright kid, I’m going for some training with Sam,” Bucky announced and patted Celina’s shoulder. “Don’t do anything stupid, okay?” He gave the boys a knowing glance before leaving. “Only if you don’t do Sam–” Celina retorted, making Peter 1 spit out his water. “Woah!” 

“I gotta be honest, they do have some chemistry,” Bob mused, “I’ve been wondering what’s going on there.” Bucky sighed and shook his head, but the slight blush couldn’t be hidden from Celina. She smirked and patted his arm. “Alright, go do your ‘sparring’” He rolled his eyes again and finally left. 

The group laughed to themselves, finishing their breakfast before they went back to their usual spot in the lounge. 

Every one of them had brought pillows and blankets to create a makeshift cozy corner, which actually did its job, as long as they rebuilt it every now and then, because the pillows fell down every other second. Celina let herself fall onto a specifically large one—from Joaquin’s usual guestroom, but he didn’t need that anymore since he’s been spending his nights in Bob’s room anyway—just to have it slip to the side, making her hit her shoulder on the chair they tried to use for stabilization. “Ouch!”

“Hey, are you okay?”, Peter 3 asked while suppressing a chuckle. Despite his amusement, he held out a hand to pull the fallen girl up again. Celina sighed, pulling herself up with a roll of her eyes. “Yeah, I’m good. Amazing, actually.” She placed the pillow back where it belonged, sitting back down. 

“So…” Bob began, “how did you want to celebrate our rise into the higher ranks, Harley? Any special plans?” The blonde smirked and stretched to lean back, falling onto the makeshift hammock. “I was thinking… about a whole day, right here, just us, with nothing to do. But that’s a bit boring, honestly. Any ideas?” 

“Well, maybe we could finally order the stuff for Lina’s room? I’ve got access to Tony’s credit card, so that won’t be an issue,” the younger Peter suggested.

“Yeah, let’s do that,” Celina agreed and opened her pinterest board to check the list. “Alright, first would be the fake ivy. I dunno, just some singular strands, nothing special.” Peter nodded and started looking it up. “It’s in the cart. What’s next?” And so they kept going through the list, finding everything they’d planned to get.

By noon, they were already lying around lazily, staring at the ceiling while dropping random sentences every now and then. “There’s a stain on the ceiling…” Celina whispered right into the younger Spidey’s ear, who stared at the area she’d pointed towards, trying hard to find that stain. “Wait, really? Where?” Celina sighed. “You can’t see it? It’s right there, dumbass.”

Peter kept searching the ceiling, but failed to find it. Then he realized it. “You’re just screwing with me, aren’t you?” Celina managed to keep a very serious face as she shook her head, but soon failed to hold back her giggles. “You’re so easy to fuck with, man. It’s almost cute.” 

Spider-man blushed in embarrassment and lightly slapped her arm. “Stop it, seriously. It’s annoying.” But the hint of a chuckle betrayed his words. Celina smiled and took out her book, starting to read as the squad just lounged around in silence. 

After a while, Bob spoke up: “Can you put on some music? No one’s here, they shouldn’t mind.” Celina took her eyes off the pages and turned towards him. “Sure, what do you want?” Bob thought for a moment, staring off into the void (heh, see what i did there? ;)) “Well, something calm would be nice. Preferably an album, I like that better than playlists.” She nodded and looked at the rest of the group. “Any ideas for calm albums or do y’all want me to pull up some shit no one knows?” They shrugged and some made gestures that seemed to say Go ahead, so Celina started thinking of albums that might fit the mood. 

Then, she finally had an idea. “Hey, Friday?” – “Yes, Miss Barnes?” – “Could you play Cigarettes After Sex? The album, I mean.” – “Of course, there you go.” 

Soon, the soft sound of the guitar filled the lounge, wrapping the group with the feeling of a cozy fall afternoon, despite it being March and noon. To fit the atmosphere perfectly, it started to rain in that exact moment. The droplets drummed against the large windows, the clouds giving the light a certain darkness. Celina liked that darkness. It was soothing in a way, almost magical. 

“Not as unknown as I expected,” the older Peter commented on the music with a smile.

Celina returned his expression and  opened her book again and flipped to the marked page to continue reading. After finishing a few chapters, she decided to put it down and perhaps interact with the others. “Well, this is getting pretty boring,” Harley commented at the same time Celina wanted to speak up. Everyone nodded, except Bob, who had actually begun to doze off slightly. He rubbed his eyes and yawned, accidentally poking Harley’s stomach with his elbow, causing the boy to let out a surprising squeal that drew chuckles from the surrounding people. “I’m so sorry–!” Bob began to apologize, but the injured Harley only waved it off with a scoff. 

“If the lot of you are so bored, why don’t you talk to each other? You have been awfully quiet for a group hangout.”

The voice came from the door. To be precise, it was Wanda’s twin Pietro. Celina didn’t know much about him yet, they hadn’t talked much yet. They hadn’t really talked at all if you ignored the occasional ‘Hey’ in the hallways or ‘Could you pass me the salt?’ at the dinner table. What Celina had in fact noticed, was that Pietro liked to appear seemingly out of thin air. And he managed to scare the shit out of everyone he addressed, without failure. 

“Holy shit, Pietro!”, the younger Peter exclaimed, which shocked everyone. He… he cursed. Everyone’s eyes were on him and he blushed slightly. “What…?” Harley looked at him, slowly collecting the necessary words to form a fitting sentence. “You… you said ‘shit’, Parker. You said a curse word. You, Peter Benjamin Parker, Tony Stark’s golden child, said ‘shit’!” The blonde wiped away a fake tear and patted Peter’s shoulder proudly. “My brother is growing up. It happens so fast, I can barely believe it…”

While the older Peter chuckled at their banter, the younger one rolled his eyes and swatted the hand away from his shoulder. “I’m just as old as you, you know? I’m not a child anymore.” – “I don’t care, you will always be our little baby-boy. You’re lucky Celina took your spot as the infant.” 

Hearing her name, Celina immediately turned to face Harley with an almost outraged look. “Excuse me? Infant ? Are you serious?” 

Harley just grinned, showing all his teeth. Celina nearly had to drop her furious act because that grin, that grin that revealed all of Harley’s slightly crooked teeth, was just too adorable not to smile back. 

In this past week, Celina had noticed quite a few perks of the people in her new little squad. Bob always carries little stones or trinkets in his pockets; most of them are from Joaquín, he brings him something whenever he comes back from a mission. 

The older Peter often had very expressive head movements. He wouldn’t simply shake his head, no. When he did, you could be sure he’d throw his head from side to side. The younger Peter often started rambling once someone addressed a topic he was interested in. 

And Harley… Well, Harley had that shiteating grin he’d show whenever he’d tease someone. 

Celina smiled to herself, dropping the outraged act. She just shook her head and took out her phone. No new messages. Good. She hadn’t missed anything important. “You know, we should probably be doing more than just sit here. Or at least do something while we’re here. School is starting again tomorrow and I don't want to have wasted this last bit of freedom.”

“We should respect the infant’s wishes,” Harley agreed, standing up. “What can we do, folks? What exciting adventures shall we embark on?” Bob only snorted at his dramatics, not even bothering to keep up. “I think I’ll go up onto the roof,” said the older Peter. “I haven’t done that in a while.” 

“I think we should maybe not spend the entire day sitting on top of each other,” the younger Peter stated right after. “I think I’ll be in the lab. There’s some projects I need to finish.”  He grabbed Harley’s hand and dragged him out of the lounge. Now it was only Bob, Pietro and Celina, since Peter 3 had used the opportunity to disappear onto the rooftop.

“I’ll go for a run,” Pietro announced and disappeared as quickly as he came. Now it was just Celina and Bob. They looked at each other and shrugged. Joaquín had left earlier, so it was just the two of them.

“What are we gonna do now?” asked Celina and Bob sighed. “I mean, we could read… Didn’t you have to finish that book for school?” She nodded, and so they went to their rooms to get their respective books before falling back onto their pillows, their eyes following the lines of letters. 

***

Monday morning

Celina groaned when her alarm rang. It wasn’t much earlier than the last weeks, but the fact she had to get up alone made it worse. As she dragged herself out of bed, every step felt like a chore. But, if she had to be honest, that was probably entirely her own fault. She hadn’t exactly gone to bed early the night before.

Despite her lack of motivation at first, Celina managed to enter the kitchen before anyone else. She preferred the quieter mornings, with time for herself and her food. As she sat there and ate her oatmeal spoon by spoon, her thoughts started to drift into the background. At some point she had zoned out so far, she didn’t even notice the people taking seats around the table with her.

Only a “Morning, kiddo” from Bucky managed to finally rip her out of her dream-like state. “Oh, hey. Good morning, Bucky,” she replied with a tired smile.

The man chuckled as he ruffled her hair. “I told you you should put the book down in time. Or did you practice your vocabulary?” Celina frowned slightly. “What vocabulary…?” 

Bucky sighed. That was enough to remind Celina. 

“Fuck– I had a vocabulary test, didn’t I? Was it English?” 

Bucky nodded. “Yes, Celina. You have a vocabulary test in English. If I remember correctly, it’s in your first period already, isn’t it?” Celina just facepalmed, embarrassed that she had forgotten about that over the spring break. “But hey, it’s English, it can’t be that hard. I mean, I speak it daily, so…” She smiled at him, awkwardly. 

“Wait, a vocabulary test in English? ” Sam asked, taking a seat next to Bucky, who sighed. “She’s going to a German school. She’ll spend the next year at a high school, but we’ll see how she’s going to keep going after–” Celina rolled her eyes. “I can talk for myself, Bucky,” she interrupted him. 

Bucky sighed again. “I know you can, doll. I’m sorry.”  

Celina shrugged it off. “It’s fine. Just maybe don’t answer questions for me when I can answer them myself just fine, okay?” Bucky nodded and they went back to eating in silence. Well, there was silence between the two of them, but Sam? He kept talking to Bucky in a pretty quiet tone, which didn’t help with the rumors at all. 

The rest of the day passed without complications. Well, school wasn’t the most exciting thing in the world, but it was bearable. The English test was as easy as expected, just some simple vocabulary. The most exciting thing that happened was Celina’s guitar class in the afternoon.

Chapter Text

It was May. The third of said month, to be precise. Despite Peter 1 having tried everything to get Celina to start preparing for their Star Wars binge-session overnight, there she was now. Sitting in Helen Cho's lab, holding a cardboard box with a small, white kitten.

Dr. Cho was preparing the table to vet the cat, who had been mewling desperately ever since Celina had picked up the box it was sitting in. The mewls quieted down as the girl lightly scratched it between the ears, and Helen gave her a grateful look.

"Alright, you said she's a stray?," Helen asked and took the kitten out of the box, looking at it from different angles. Celina shrugged and put the box down. "Found her in this box, she was pretty wet from the rain yesterday. There was some food in a plastic bowl but it was all clumped together." She looked at the skinny fur ball—or rather a fur noodle—and smiled softly, full of pity for the poor animal.

"She's probably got tons of germs sticking to her, and I think one of her legs is injured, she's walking weird. Not the way kittens do when they've just been born, I've seen how that's supposed to look." Helen nodded at Celina's observations and started examining the cat.

After assessing the different aspects of its health, the doctor smiled. "Well, you're lucky. It seems she hadn't been on the street for too long. She's definitely malnourished and has a small fracture in her left hind leg, but she's healthy otherwise. Completely free of parasites." After putting said fractured leg into bandages, she placed the kitten back into the box.

"You should definitely wash her, though. She's pretty dirty. I'll give you some recommendations for food and other necessities."

Celina smiled at the tiny animal in her hands, then back at the woman in front of her. "Thanks, Helen. I'm so glad you know stuff about animals too, would've been a nightmare if I'd had to go to a separate vet."

Dr. Cho just shrugged it off and scribbled down a list of things to buy. "No problem. I can't show my skill that often, so it's nice to know I'm needed once in a while." She slid the paper over the table. "There. I wrote down an address for a shop with high-quality products. And this, so you can wash and feed her until you buy the things yourself."

After Helen gave her some advice on washing the kitten, Celina muttered a quick thank you, Celina left the room with the cardboard box. She stepped into the elevator, hoping no one would comment on the little animal.

But she wasn't as lucky as she had hoped she would be.

No, she just had to meet Bucky inside.

"Hey, kid. What'cha got there?" he asked and leaned over the carton with curiosity, just for his eyes to widen in surprise. Celina wasn't sure yet, if that was positive or not.

"Is that… a cat? Celina, where the hell did you get that from?!"

A sigh. Then she swallowed before looking up at Bucky again. "I… I found her when I came back from my sleepover at Lisa's place. You know, my friend from school?" Celina could practically feel his disapproval on her skin.

"Come on, don't look at me like that. She was completely wet in that box at the subway station, I couldn't just leave her there!"

The heavy sigh she got as a response carried a hint of fond annoyance.

"Celina, as much as I adore your love for animals, you could have at least called me to ask. You can't just grab a random animal off the street!"

As if having sensed the rising tension, the topic of the conversation let out a soft mewl. Even the grumpy Bucky couldn't but find it adorable.

"Alright, you look way too attached already. Have you gotten her checked yet?"

Celina smiled, full of relief, and nodded. "I just got out of Helen's lab, she gave me a list of things we'll have to buy–" "Nuh-uh, there's no 'we'. You dragged the cat here, it's your responsibility. I'll pay for it, but you'll take care of that thing."

Celina grinned, accepting that condition. "So that means I can keep her?"

A single nod from Bucky.

"As long as you take care of it. Now go wash that thing, she smells like a dumpster. And I get to pick a name, got it?"

Now Celina was the one to nod. "Any ideas yet?"

"I'll think of something."

Celina's grin widened as Bucky left the elevator after that sentence. She had a cat. A small white kitten. A precious little animal she'd give her soul for.

Not long after, she stepped out of the elevator and made her way to her room in quick strides, nearly tripping over her schoolbag as she took the turn around the corner to her bathroom.

Celina placed the box on the counter next to the sink, plugged it, and turned on the water.

After checking if she remembered everything Helen had told her and if the water level was high enough, she carefully took the kitten out of her box, wrapped the bandaged legs in plastic, and lowered her into the lukewarm water.

The cat was surprisingly calm about the whole thing and even played around, hitting the surface with her paws and trying to catch the flying droplets. The sight made Celina chuckle as she opened the soap Helen had given her to properly clean the animal.

The click of the opening shampoo bottle made the kitten jump slightly, but Celina could easily calm her down with a few gentle scratches behind her ears.

It was an adorable picture. The completely soaked kitten playing with the warm water around itself, purring nearly as loud as Bucky's motorcycle while Celina gently and thoroughly washed the germs and dirt off of it.

She shampooed for a whole three rounds, just to make sure, before placing it on a clean towel. Celina had to suppress her laughter at the sight of the dripping fur dragging down the kitten with the weight of the water.

It may have taken a while, but Celina managed to dry the cat completely. That didn't stop her from keeping it wrapped up in the towel, the sight of the pink nose poking out was too endearing.

With the white ball of fluff in her arms, she went back into her bedroom, searching for a box that was clean, unlike the cardboard she'd found the kitten in.

The shoe box should do it, Celina thought, picking it up from the ground. She had enough blankets in her room to fold one and create a cozy cat bed, so it took her less than a minute to place the fur ball in its new home.

Celina nearly squealed from the sight of its big blues looking up at her, so full of curiosity.

"Let's get you some food. Okay, sweetheart?" Celina smiled and let her gaze trail over the room in an attempt to find some sort of bowl. She stopped at her desk, spotting the bowl she'd painted at a friend's birthday a few months ago. She grinned at the Red Hood Logo she'd painted onto the bottom. One of the few times that her pottery painting didn't turn out completely hideous.

The sound of the cat food falling onto the ceramics drew a loud, almost desperate string of mewls from the kitten. Celina chuckled and placed the bowl in the shoe box.

The hungry animal fell face-first into the bowl, not even bothering to chew as it swallowed the brown pellets.

* * *

Half an hour of cat-watching later, there was a soft knock on the door. Another one. And a third. Followed by something close to a storm of knuckles loudly drumming against the door.

Celina groaned and stumbled across the room, only for a bunch of sandy blonde hair to fall into her face as soon as she'd pushed down the door handle.

"Fucking hell, Harley!" she exclaimed after pushing the older boy out of her eyes.

"Sorry, Darlin'," he laughed and brushed the locks aside. "Bucket said you got a cat now and Pete's been a whiny bitch all day 'cause you wouldn't spend time with him. I can't believe you've already replaced me after barely two months!"

"I'm not–" Peter 1 began but got interrupted by Harley raising a finger at him. "Nuh-uh, you're already starting again."

Celina rolled her eyes at their banter, even though she had to admit that she did find it amusing.

"So, you're here for the cat, huh?"

Eager nodding from Peter, a shrug from Harley.

"Did you say cat?" Bob's head popped up behind the other two boys, followed by Peter 3.

Celina just sighed and nodded, letting them all into her room. Usually, she would have shushed them for talking too much, but Bob already did that for her.

The guys knelt down around the shoe box and Celina could have sworn that she could hear Harley whisper something along the lines of "Fucking hell, that is adorable."

Celina took a look as well. The white kitten was pressed into the corner of the box, tiny ears and pink nose barely peeking out of the surprisingly thick fur.

She smiled at the sight of all of her new friends together–including the cat, of course.

Peter 1 was the first to step back and turn to look at Celina. He was grinning, then reached out to clutch her upper arms.

"Okay, listen, I love your new cat—does it have a name, by the way?—anyway, we have to prepare for a movie marathon because I cannot let you live your teenage years without watching Star Wars, that's just disrespectful, so I made a list of things we need to collect–"

"Calm down, man." The older Peter chuckled and patted the younger one's shoulder. "We'll help you prepare, alright?"

He just nodded and pulled out a piece of paper, almost completely filled with scribbled key points.

"So, we're gonna get all our blankets and pillows into one of our bedrooms because the rest of the team doesn't want to join and a smaller group is just better in general. Then we need fairy lights and candles to set the mood. For drinks I thought coke, energy, some hot chocolate or whatever, and that stuff Celina got so much from at the world market."

"You mean Spezi?"

"Yes, that. And I wanna bake pizza to prepare for it. And it's a movie marathon, we need popcorn, chips, and pretzels."

Bob looked thoughtful. "Do we have everything we need for pizza? Otherwise we'll have to go buy them."

"I'll go check the kitchen," said the older Spider-man, walking off.

He returned only a few moments later. "Unless anyone has specific desires, we have everything we need. Enough ingredients for the dough, the sauce, the cheese, salami, and I think we have some vegetables too."

Celina nodded in approval. "S'pose we'll just have to pick a room to watch in and carry everything there."

* * *

After having dragged all the pillows, blankets, and fairy lights into Peter and Harley's shared room—honorable mention: Celina's fifteen candles—the group was now standing in the compound's kitchen.

Both Peter's were standing around the oven, Bob was getting the utensils, Celina was coordinating everything. And Harley?

"Oh shit–!"

The floor was covered in white powder.

"Did you just–" Celina sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Of course you'd drop the ONLY bag of flour we have."

Harley just pulled his mouth into a straight line of awkwardness, raising his hands defensively. "I didn't mean to…?"

Celina just shook her head and looked through all the cupboards, trying to find something. She placed the pack of whole-grain flour on the counter with enough force to make a point, but gently enough so she wouldn't repeat Harley's mistake.

"Guess you'll have to live with this then," she threw at him, giving him a pointed look.

Harley shrunk into himself, muttering a clearly intimidated apology.

Celina chuckled and patted the poor boy's shoulder. She definitely felt sorry for him. "I'm joking. I'm not actually this pissed."

"We will have to use the whole-grain flour though."

Harley rolled his eyes and muttered something about how he's not "some health nut".

The preparation of the dough worked pretty well. Bob had thought of everything when getting together the needed objects, Peter 1 measured everything and Peter 3 kneaded the dough. Harley was still sulking on a chair.

"Harley, could you make yourself useful for once and help me with the sauce? You can cut the tomatoes."

The boy got up from his chair and dragged his feet as he walked over, grabbing a knife and a cutting board.

"All of them?" He asked, trying to sound as unmotivated as possible, though it was obvious that he was only acting.

Celina answered his question with a nod. "All of them."

Only a few minutes into the process, Harley had gotten very enthusiastic on the cutting, having shaped about two thirds of the vegetables into scarily accurate squares and rectangles.

That's when Bucky walked in, seeing the group of five work together so… harmonically. The sight made him smile fondly.

"How're you doing, Celina?" he asked, walking over to her blending the sauce.

She perked up and tilted her head slightly to the side.

"Oh, hi Bucky." Celina paused the blender and rested it against the edge of the sauce bowl. "I'm doing alright, I guess. How about you?"

The older man shrugged and leaned against the counter, watching as Celina gave the sauce over to Bob, who had been waiting to spread it over the dough both of the Peters had shaped into six pizzas.

"Not much different, I suppose. Though I don't have to take care of a kitten, so it's a little less stressful. You've washed her by now, right?," he asked, making sure Celina had kept her promise.

The girl returned from the kitchen table and nodded.

"Of course I've washed her. Can't have the poor thing sit around in its own germs for even longer. Have you thought of a name yet?"

At that, Bucky's smile started showing a hint of pride as he nodded affirmatively.

"I have."

"Please don't tell us it's something like Snowball," Peter 1 asked in an almost pleading tone, clearly not fully trusting Bucky when it came to naming animals.

He just shrugged. "Well, I'm pretty sure she's gonna be the death of me at some point, so I thought Alpine would fit–"

"Bucky!"

Steve entered the kitchen with an expression of mock-outrage.

"I thought we agreed not to joke about that. It was traumatic for both of us."

Bucky laughed, patting the blonde's shoulder. "Sorry, pal. That's just how I handle it best."

He then turned back to Celina. "So, what do you say about the name? Do you approve?"

The girl thought for a moment, then nodded.

"Yea, I think I like it."

* * *

"Alright, folks," the younger Peter began, standing in front of the group with his hands on his hips, "the whole marathon would take thirteen and a half hours, which is why I suggest taking a break in-between. Unless you're okay with pulling through the whole thing."

His friend Ned had arrived a few minutes ago, never missing out on an opportunity to do something Star Wars related.

The older Peter calculated for a moment, then spoke up.

"Well, it's three p.m. right now, so we'd be here until about five in the morning if we watched everything in one sitting. If we broke it up into two parts, we'd be done with the first half around nine."

Harley raised his hand.

"I vote for everything in one sitting, I ain't tired at nine p.m. And we got enough caffeine to make it until five."

Everyone nodded, agreeing that he was right.

The group got comfortable, sitting on the large amount of pillows and blankets they had brought together. Ned had brought his own set too. Everyone had a pizza on their lap, the drinks on a coffee table in the middle.

Bob set up the movie, then sat back down, dropping his head onto Celina's.

She chuckled, brushing his hair out of her face. "That tickles, man!"

He apologized but everything got quiet as the first scene began to play.

It didn't take the group very long until their legs were a tangled mess in a pile of blankets, and if someone were to walk in on them, Celina was pretty sure they would not have been able to tell which limbs belonged to whom.

* * *

One thing Celina would always be grateful for, is the comfortable silence she could sit in with the small group of friends she'd made since moving into the Avengers compound.

The quiet afternoons in the lab, where Harley would work on a project, she'd do her homework or study for tests, Bob and Peter 3 would read a book—the former occasionally having a certain falcon's head on his lap, the latter usually listening to music—and Peter 1 watching Harley work, helping out every now and then.

It was peaceful, and much more comfortable than the situation she'd escaped about a year ago.

No constant yelling in the background of the music in her headphones, no having to fear saying the wrong thing and being at fault for another argument that might end up getting physical.

Just… Celina, her friends, the Avengers.

Her new family.

Chapter Text

"Can you wake me up when the break starts?".

Celina looked over at her desk mate, then the teacher to check if she'd notice, then back to the girl, and gave her a small smile, in combination with a nod.

"Thanks, man," said Briar—the formerly mentioned desk mate—and rested her head on her arms. It hadn't taken her long before she switched positions and placed her head on Celina's shoulder.

Celina smiled before going back to watching the movie at the front.

Since it was the last lesson in Italian before the summer break, their teacher had decided to let them watch something, as long as she got to pick it. So now they were watching a movie about some children's choir.

It wasn't as bad as some movies you'd expect from a teacher, but it wasn't important either, so she respected Briar's choice to use the time for sleep instead.

When the teacher paused the movie, promising to finish it after the break—though Celina wasn't sure if half the class would even remember the plot after six weeks—she gently shook her friend awake.

"Hm…?" was the murmured response she got.

"You told me to wake you up when the break starts, dumbass. Here's your sign. You've missed out on peak entertainment, now you don't even know what Sebastiano did to end up in jail," Celina gave her a disappointed sigh, which Briar saw through immediately.

"Well, if it was so great, we should watch it during the break when you're staying at my place," she suggested and grabbed her notebook to add it to the list of things they were planning to do together in that week, since Briar's parents were away for most of the day.

"Sounds like a plan, but could you get your ass up and out of the room? I don't want us to be the last ones to leave under the judgemental stare of Mrs. Rossi."

Briar chuckled and put the notebook away after quickly scribbling down the idea, then followed Celina out onto the schoolyard for the break.

Once that was over, their last double period of the year started. They received their report cards and talked about plans for the break. The girls just smirked at each other, knowing exactly what kind of things they were going to do, after a week of meticulous planning.

Then, release finally came. The last bell of the day rang.

Their things were packed rather quickly, but the staircases were crowded as hell, so that part took them a bit longer.

"Is your mom picking us up or do we have to take twenty different trains?," Celina asked, taking a deep breath as she adjusted her duffel bag on her shoulder.

"Mom's busy, we'll have to go alone. And if we hurry up, we might actually catch the train without having to wait half an hour, so stop standing around like that."

Celina huffed and pulled Briar towards the school's entrance.

Briar yelped as she got dragged through the masses of students around the main entrance. She only got to catch her breath once the two of them had made it past the chaos.

"That was not necessary," Briar gasped. "That's not what I meant by hurrying up."

She rolled her eyes at the grin Celina flashed her.

"Well, we're closer to the subway, aren't we? I'd say I did my job well enough."

"Your job," Briar hissed, "was to move your own ass, not to drag mine along."

Celina just shrugged, not having dropped the shit-eating grin from before. As she didn't see a good reason to keep arguing, Briar just followed her friend.

The subway was surprisingly empty, in contrary to the central station. The platforms were packed, which made it hard for them to get to their train in time, but it was manageable with a few sprints in-between. Finally on the train, they quickly caught the last available pair of seats.

"Alright, how long's the ride again?," asked Celina, her hand already inside her bag to grab a book.

"Should be around thirty minutes, I think," replied Briar, whose book was already in her lap.

And so a pretty quiet train ride started, with the two girls reading next to each other, sharing headphones, and occasionally watching the landscape outside gradually morph from city scapes to lush greenery.

After half an hour, the electronic voice announced their stop. Celina looked down at Briar, whose head had fallen onto her shoulder, before gently shaking her awake for the second time today.

"Are we there yet…?" came a muffled response.

"In a moment," Celina explained. "And maybe get your book of the floor so we get off the train before the doors close again."

Briar packed her backpack and Celina slung the duffel bag over her shoulder, then they made their way to the door, waiting for the train to get to a halt.

Off the train, they switched to the bus, riding another twenty minutes until they were finally only a small walk away from Briar's home. Celina realized in that moment, that it would be her first time there. She'd only ever heard of that house from what their shared friends had told her.

"Alright, here we are."

Briar grabbed the keys from her pocket and unlocked the front door.

"Welcome to the Wayne Manor."

Celina fondly rolled her eyes at the joke and stepped inside, taking off her shoes. It was cozy, she couldn't lie about that. But calling it a manor would still have been an overstatement.

"I like the colors. Not too bright. And definitely not millennial gray."

Briar snorted. "Yeah, I insisted on that. Told my parents I wouldn't have moved in if they'd made it gray."

The corners of Celina's mouth curved up in a small grin. "Didn't expect any less from you. Now, where's your room? The bag's getting heavy."

A quick walk upstairs and into the closest door, Celina finally dropped her bag to the ground and took a deep breath. She took her time to take a look around the room, examining the few posters and gaming setup.

"Looks good in here too. I like the picture above the bed. Especially Spooderman."

Briar cackled and opened the drawer of even more pictures of mostly memes, some actually well done photographs. "Thought you could help me put them up while you're here."

"In case we get bored, huh? Well, I'd be okay with that. If you return the favor as soon as you stay over at my place."

Briar placed the pictures on the desk before plopping down on the bed, then staring at the ceiling.

"Speaking of which…" She propped herself up on her elbows. "Where do you live? You've never said where you moved since may."

Celina sat down next to her and sighed. "Well, I'd love to tell you, but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't believe it."

"Try me, bitch."

Briar took a look at the picture, then her jaw dropped.

"You're joking."

An exchanged look between the two.

"You're not?"

It had taken her quite a while, but after a lot of talking, Celina had managed to convince Briar that she was being entirely honest.

"You're telling me your 'dad' is Bucky Barnes himself. You live at the Avengers compound. And you're best friends with two Spider-men."

"Yes."

"And they're completely fine with you telling me all that?"

Celina paused.

Shit.

She hadn't thought of that.

"Well… If you promise not to tell anyone…?"

"Celina, you are so stupid sometimes! Book smart perhaps but why the hell did you think it would be a good idea to tell a 'random' person about all that?!"

Celina shrunk a little, pretty embarrassed by her own stupidity.

"I wasn't… thinking, okay?? It was dumb to just spill all that, I know."

She sighed and rubbed her temple before straightening up again, staring at Briar with something close to fear.

"You won't tell everyone about that, right? Please, promise you won't tell anyone, Natasha would kill me! I'm pretty sure I might lose music privileges too…"

Briar's eyebrows went up slightly, unimpressed.

"Music privileges? That's what you're worried about? Not the fact I could be a super secret spy or something like that, and that I'd report you to some super secret organization? Don't worry, though. Your family secrets are safe with me. I'll keep my cake hole shut."

Celina let out a sigh of relief before lifting her pinky.

"Promise?"

"Promise."

Briar hooked her pinky into Celina's with a feigned serious look in her eyes.

But the seriousness hadn't lasted very long before the two of them burst out laughing from the intense eye contact.

They managed to catch their breath after what felt like an eternity of wheezing, pausing, and cackling again because the other had made a funny face while trying to do the exact opposite.

"Alright, what now?" Celina asked, still trying to control her breathing to slow it down.

Briar looked around her room before her gaze settled on Celina's duffel bag.

"You could move your bathroom necessities over there. To have them where you need them, you know?"

Celina nodded and dug through her clothes and school objects to find the smaller, hand-sewn bag. A quick sprint across the hallway and back later, she was sitting on the same spot as before.

"Alright, what did we put on the list?"

Briar took the tablet out of her backpack and opened her notes. Once she read it, she only snorted and rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, well, we didn't plan anything for today except 'card games and chill', and cooking dinner. Doesn't exactly help our situation. We could set up some games in the garden, though."

So the two of them went ahead and grabbed some of the games from Briar's own collection and the ones Celina had brought with herself. In addition, Briar filled a few bowls with strawberries, watermelon and bananas, plus a refill of their water bottles. (Stay hydrated, children!)

One pick-nick setup later, the two of them were engrossed in a multitude of games, each party ending up getting very heated with dramatic music in the background.

After their fifteenth round of Uno, Celina checked her watch.

"Damn, it's almost seven. I think we should start cooking."

To sum it up, their first cooking session of the week they'd spend together was a disaster. They were trying to make summer roll burritos, but half of the filling dropped to the plate before either of them could take a bite. Neither could complain about the taste, though.

The girls ended up back in Briar's room around nine. Both of them in their pajamas, they sat on her bed, scrolling on their phones before Celina dropped hers onto the mattress.

"We're on summer break, for fuck's sake!", she exclaimed. "At a sleep over. We can't spend the whole time on our phones, I'm sure there's something better to do. And maybe no card games now, I've had enough of those."

Briar sighed and put her phone down as well. "You're right," she agreed. "How about we pick a movie series or some show to watch over the week? Something not too long that we could finish while you're here."

"And what?" Celina asked, raising her eyebrows. "Any ideas?"

"I found this list," Briar began as she pulled out her phone, "of movies for summer. Emotional ones. Let's watch all those, if you're okay with that."

Celina nodded, getting up again to walk downstairs to grab a few snacks. "You coming, then?"

"So quick all of a sudden? Thought you would let this old lady take her time to get up." Briar faked a cough and stumbled behind her friend.

"You're two months older."

"Two months that I used to gain more experience."

One corner of Celina's mouth twitched upwards. "Experience in what, sucking on pacifiers?"

Briar let out an outraged gasp, a hand flying to her chest. "How dare you! As if you didn't have them yourself."

"I had one," Celina retorted. "And I usually spat it out after a few seconds."

"Seriously?"

She simply shrugged. "Guess I just preferred the real deal."—"The real–?"—"Nipples, Briar. Nipples."

"Oh."

"Alright, let's stop talking about breasts and set up the movie," Celina closed the previous topic. "In your room or the living room?"

"Well, my parents might come home soon, so I think my room would be better. They'll probably want some space first."

Celina nodded at Briar's reasoning, agreeing with her words. She finally dragged Briar downstairs where they prepared their movie.

While her friend made hot chocolate, following a secret recipe, Celina cut some strawberries and grapes into a bowl with coconut milk, something they'd both been in love with ever since their Batman marathon in June.

Celina carried the bowls upstairs before rushing downstairs again to assist Briar, if needed.

It wasn't needed.

The two girls went back upstairs and set up Briar's laptop on her bed, getting ready to watch that move.

It was nearly midnight when they finished "A Room With A View". After that long day, they managed to brush their teeth with barely opened eyes, before falling into the shared bed.

***

CELINA BARNES

HOW DARE YOU NOT TEXT US WHEN YOU GOT TO YOUR FRIEND'S HOUSE

WE WERE WORRIED

ALPINE NEARLY HAD A PANIC ATTACK

srsly tho

bucky spent abt three hours talking to himself (and the cat) about being a "terrible guardian"

the guy was WORRIED

Those were some of the messages Celina had woken up to the next morning, all from Harley. Bucky himself hadn't written a thing.

Briar was still asleep, so she opened her chat with him and started typing about being incredibly sorry for not texting, she'd simply forgotten and been too tired to really think, since the heat had really gotten to her.

While Celina was still typing furiously, her friend started stirring, letting out soft, cat-like sounds as she stretched thoroughly.

Briar glanced at Celina, then the phone in her hand.

"Dude," she groaned as the extended her arms above her head, "how are you on that thing already?"

"As if you wouldn't do the same if I weren't here," Celina retorted and sent the sixth message to Bucky.

A snort left Briar's nostrils as she sat up to lean her back against the head rest of the bed.

"You're right. I've got a better question," she began, "How long have you been awake?"

Celina shrugged and put her phone back onto the bedside table.

"Not too long," she said, accompanied by a yawn. "I just saw the texts and realized I forgot to tell Bucky I got here just fine. He gets worried easily, you know?"

"Mhmm… I get why he would." Briar sighed and pushed her braid out of her face.

This morning, their attempt at making an edible meal for breakfast didn't fail as royally as last night's dinner and they managed to make somewhat presentable pancakes.

The rest of the morning and noon was spent looking through Briar's closet, trying on clothes, and deciding which ones they'd bring to the nearest thrift store in the afternoon.

It had taken them a while, but in the end, they entered the store with two full bags and left with some more money in Briar's wallet.

Back home, the two of them dropped back onto the bed, cleaning up the rest of their mess before eating dinner. Alone again, Briar's parents were still working.

***

The next few days passed rather quickly, with Briar and Celina doing several things together to check off their "summer friend date" list: going to a farmers' market on Friday, a weekend at the nearest beach, buying and building a Lego flower bouquet on Monday, etc.

They stayed inside on Tuesday and Wednesday, due to the sky deciding to cancel their plans with rain.

So now it was Thursday morning. Briar was still asleep, but Celina was awake. She looked over at her friend's face with a fond smile.

I could just reach over and–

No.

She couldn't just kiss her sleeping friend.

Why the hell would she do that?

She didn't even have feelings for her.

With a quiet sigh, she stopped herself from spiraling even further and lied back to stare at the ceiling.

At exactly 1 AM, Briar stood in the doorway with her parents' tent, waiting for Celina to follow her outside with her duffel bag of camping necessities.

After stumbling down the stairs and into the garden shed, they strapped the bag, tent and sleeping bags to their bicycles. Celina borrowed Briar's mom's bike since she didn't bring her own all the way here.***

They quickly filled their water bottles, packed some sandwiches and started the trip to the nearest forest.

The sun shone onto their faces, nearly blinding the girls as they rode on, enjoying the green scenery around them and pointing out the different animals they saw at the side of the road. The birds were singing quite loudly, but it was a nice change from the mechanical humming or constant dialogue that would be in the background at the Avengers HQ.

An hour later, they arrived at the border of a forest and hopped off their bikes, pushing them forward and over the still wet earth. Soon they arrived at a small clearing, large enough for the tent they'd brought.

Briar took the tent and her sleeping bag off of her bike and leaned it against a tree, Celina did the same after strapping off her own bag and the camping mats.

Briar struggled a little when it came to building the tent, but with some help from Celina, it didn't take over five minutes. The mats were put inside, sleeping bags on top, and they sat down on some thicker roots of the largest tree nearby.

"So… when were you gonna tell me you're a survival expert?" Briar asked as she picked up a stick and broke it into tiny pieces she'd throw against the walls of the tent.

"I wouldn't exactly call it that, I just went camping with my dad in the summer," Celina told her, smiling slightly as she remembered what it was like. "We'd usually take his motorcycle and drive to a campsite next to a river. I always helped setting up the tent."

"Bucky likes camping?" Briar asked, looking at Celina with a raised eyebrow.

She shook her head and her gaze fell to the ground. "I meant my bio dad. Back in Germany."

"Oh."

Celina shook her head when she saw the guilty look on Briar's face.

"Don't feel bad about it. There's some good memories, those are fine. Just, maybe don't ask about the things that ended up causing me to get taken from them."

Briar nodded. "Got it."

They ate the food they brought, then spent the rest of the afternoon listening to music, playing card games and reading.

When the sun started setting, they got up to take a small walk through the forest. The orange sunbeams broke through the leaves around them, dipping the area into an almost magical golden light.

Just as the last bits of sunlight were about to disappear behind the horizon, Briar and Celina arrived back at their tent and sat down on the roots.

A stick broke a few feet away.

Probably just an animal, Celina thought.

Another branch cracked. Louder. Closer.

The girls looked at each other, concerned.

"That's not a bird," Briar stated with a hint of fear.

"Not a fox either," Celina replied in a hushed whisper.

They slowly turned to the direction the sound came from and Celina's heart stopped for a second.

A large, looming figure stood there, hidden in the shadows, just watching them with its glowing yellow eyes.

It took another step closer. And another one. It began prowling towards them. Then it bolted.

Under a string of whispered curses, the girls jumped off the root they were sitting on and started sprinting into the woods. Every now and then, they checked if they could still see each other, or whether that animal was still following them.

With every step they took, their feet hurt more. With every time they tripped over a branch or stone, their pace slowed down and eventually, they lost each other.

At some point, Briar had taken a turn Celina hadn't noticed and it was too late when she finally looked around, just to see not a single soul around.

Celina reached into her pocket. Fuck. She'd left her phone at the tent.

She looked around, trying to figure out where she was, but that wasn't an easy feat when you were in an unknown forest and your brain was still fogged by fear.

Celina held onto the nearest tree, gripping the wood tight enough for the bark to crack under her fingers. She could practically hear the rush of her blood in her ears as she took one deep breath after the other in a desperate attempt to drown out that noise.

But through the consistent static in her ears, she made out a sound. Footsteps.

She checked behind herself and jumped as she was met with the vibrant eyes of that beast. It had caught up to her.

Celina bolted into the black maze of a forest, hoping to get at least a bit of distance between the two, but she knew from the start that she wouldn't be able to maintain that gap. Not when she had to compete against the leaps that animal was taking.

The sticks under Celina's feet split into tiny pieces. The air came out of her mouth is sharp gasps as she sprinted forward without any thought, her mind dazed by sheer panic.

She didn't care that her shoe was untied.

She took one turn after the other, weaving through the trees with an almost impressive lack of elegance, it was a miracle she hadn't tripped yet.

Neither did she care that she'd lost the silver ring she'd bought as a souvenir, years ago.

She didn't care about anything that moment.

Celina's actions were guided by nothing but the adrenaline coursing through her veins, desperately trying to get her away from whatever that thing was that was somewhere behind her.

Probably—no, most likely—way closer than she wanted.

Then it did happen.

The open shoelace got stuck on a root on the ground and Celina fell.

The loud steps grew closer as she struggled to get up, eventually reaching her. It was too dark to see much, so all Celina could feel was the weight of the animal on top of her, the wet fur it was covered with, and the smell of wet dog it emitted.

Celina let out an ear-splitting scream. The thing bit her, right into the waist, its large teeth piercing her flesh and pulling, but before it could take a proper bite, the forest got flooded with bright, artificial light.

Blinded by it—and the pain—Celina had her eyes closed tightly.

She barely noticed how the monster pulled its fangs out, how it bolted away into the dark night, before it all went black.