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Steve loves the way Darcy talks with her hands; all frenzied emotion and large gestures. He loves the way her eyes gleam with amusement. And he’s regretted every time he’s ever done anything to make them shine with tears.
He loves the way she smiles at him and how she has so many different smiles. He’s especially fond of the glazed “I didn’t know you could do that with your tongue.” smile. Though his favorite is they way she smiles when he returns from a mission; when she smiles like that at him it feels like home.
He loves her enthusiasm for, well, everything. And her unfettered joy at sharing those things with everyone around her.
Steve loves waking up beside her and watching her sleep, it’s the only time she holds still long enough for him to try and capture her with his pencils. Sometimes, though, he just wakes up only to see that she’s still there before curling his body around hers, letting her breathing lull him back to sleep.
Her absolute honesty endears her to him more than he can ever express; even though she’s more than half convinced she needs to learn verbal restraint. It means he never has to wonder where he stands with her; it’s a trait that reminds him of Bucky; and he wants to think his best friend would have liked her.
He loves the quiet time together in their apartment when they sit on the couch, reading and drawing, or watching a movie. Technically it’s his apartment since the one that’s hers still has some of her things in it. But most of her clothes have slowly migrated upstairs, and last week she carried up the framed picture of them kissing that had been taken by Fury’s surveillance team. Steve wonders if he should just officially invite her to move in.
Steve catches himself, sometimes, wondering what a girl like Darcy, vivacious, gorgeous, and all together in charge of her life, sees in him. Despite the serum, despite saving the world, most of the time he’s just a kid from Brooklyn who never could keep his mouth shut when it came for sticking up for the little guy.
He marvels at how strong she is. Not like Thor or Hulk, but the kind of inner strength that’s allowed her to befriend two deadly assassins, babysit volatile scientists, and keep Pepper’s life running as smoothly as she can, all while never allowing it to subsume her sense of self.
She travels now with Pepper for her new job, and he misses her when she’s gone. Privately he agrees with Tony, ‘Welcome Home’ sex is amazing.
He loves the way she sends him postcards from the places she goes. She rarely writes much; but she always signs the cards ‘Yours, Darcy’. The possessive part of him loves that she’s his.
He doesn’t know what the future holds, and he knows he risks his life every time the Avengers are called to assemble. He does know that whatever future he has he wants to spend as much of it with her as he can.
Steve Rogers loves Darcy Lewis, and he’s started to think about doing it for better or for worse, for richer or poorer, till death do us part.