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It only took Steve Rogers one glance off to the side of the stage to know that today was going to be another one of those days. He’d caught the flash of red, white, and blue as soon as he’d stepped up to the podium. Of course it was them. He would have expected no less. Bucky and Darcy, standing just outside the view of the audience, both wearing ridiculous patriotic ensembles with black sunglasses obscuring their eyes. As he watched, Darcy touched her ear, pretending to speak into a comm, and Bucky immediately responded. Then the pair looked at him, and gave a synchronized nod.
Steve thought he could hear them humming the Battle Hymn of the Republic as well. Thank God this was the last banquet. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to hold onto his sanity much longer. They’d been at it all week. Tailing him as he attended the myriad of speaking engagements, and public honors arranged for his birthday. That wasn’t so bad. Truthfully, all the hoopla over his birthday had begun to wear thin, and having friends with him had made it a bit more bearable.
For reasons that Steve couldn’t quite understand other than all-out trolling, Darcy and Bucky had appointed themselves as his personal security during the festivities. They shadowed him from engagement to engagement, overstepping their duties at every possible opportunity, and quickly becoming the most problematic pair of bodyguards Steve figured anyone ever had. Not only that, but their wardrobe got exponentially more ridiculous as the week wore on. Initially, he’d been amused, but by his actual birthday, amusement had slipped into a sort of good-natured exasperation.
The first day they wore navy blue suits, white shirts, and red ties. It was fairly normal...or what passed as normal in a decidedly abnormal situation. The next day both showed up in matching Captain America t-shirts and jeans. The third day dawned with football jerseys. Team Cap was printed across the backs, and his shield was emblazoned across the fronts. Darcy wore hers with the shortest miniskirt Steve had ever seen, and over the knee socks with red, white, and blue stripes. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t appreciate the skirt...or the amount of leg it showed off.
Today took the cake, though. Bucky was wearing a bright red and white striped windbreaker with USA embroidered on the breast pocket, and matching blue nylon pants. It was bad, but nothing compared to Darcy, who had turned up in a skintight blue catsuit with a long red zipper down the front, sequins scattered across the fabric that caught the light every time she moved, and sparkly white stars sew onto the back pockets. The clingy fabric left nothing to the imagination, and Steve almost choked on his complimentary water when he caught sight of her.
It wasn’t easy to make it through the whole speech he’d prepared for the National Captain America Boosters Club dinner being given in recognition of his service. The whole thing almost went to shit when he risked another glance their way towards the end, only to see them each solemnly holding up a single lit sparkler with dead serious expressions on their faces.
This time they were humming You’re a Grand Old Flag. Steve somehow managed to get through his last few sentences and make it off stage before losing it completely, but it was a close thing.
“Old Glory is on the move. I repeat, Old Glory is on the move,” Darcy said, falling into step behind him. “Agent Stars, do you have his twenty?”
“Roger that, Agent Stripes,” Bucky replied. “Traveling protocols engaged.”
Steve didn’t even need to look at them to know they were talking into their nonexistent comms again. He also didn’t want to examine why the newfound close friendship between his childhood buddy and the bubbly Darcy Lewis was getting him hot under his own collar. It was something Steve had been avoiding since the Bucky and Darcy had hit it off a couple months earlier when they ran into her stealing a slice of cold pizza out of the common room fridge.
“I’m not here. You didn’t see me. And if you tell Clint, I will destroy you both in a hailstorm of glitter and wrath the likes of which has never been seen on this plane or any other,” she said.
“You may not be here, but I definitely see you, doll,” Bucky responded, looking her up at down in a way Steve hadn’t seen him do to a woman since he’d been deprogrammed. Steve didn’t like it. Not one little bit.
“Don’t worry, Darce. Your secret is safe with us,” he cut in. “Although you should probably know that Clint installed a hidden camera in an empty mustard bottle after the last time his pizza went missing.”
“Shit. Seriously?” Darcy asked. She looked down at the stolen piece of pizza briefly, and then shrugged. “Oh. Well. Might as well eat it, right? No point in getting my ass kicked for nothing.”
Bucky looked at her for a long moment before walking to the fridge and deliberately taking a piece of pizza for himself. He slid onto one of the stools at the center island, took a bite of pizza, and said, “Now he’ll have to go through me first.”
She grinned, saluting him with her pizza. “I think we just became best friends, Sarge. You don’t need me to get you the garlic salt for that or anything, do you?”
“Nah. Why pollute perfectly good pizza,” he replied, and her smile widened.
“God. Thank you. I keep saying that, but none of the flavor-ignorant heathens around here ever listen to me.”
“Is that so?”
“Mhmm. You know, if you like this, you should totally check out DiPalma’s. It’s like, a thousand times better. I’ll take you if you want.”
Steve tried not to see red. He really did. It wasn’t like Darcy was his girl anything. Sure they talked sometimes, and she had a habit of showing up in his office with seemingly no other purpose than to see how his day was going, but that was pretty much it. He had plans, though. Plans that included asking her out...if he ever decided how he was going to put them into action. Now Bucky had swooped in and effortlessly done in less than a minute, what Steve had been waffling over for the past six months.
He told himself it was fine. Bucky needed friends. Steve wasn’t going to begrudge him one more. Much.
A few weeks later Steve was ripping into his second punching bag of the afternoon when Bucky sought him out in the gym. For a few seconds his friend didn’t speak, just watched the bag bounce and shudder with every jab from Steve’s bare fist. Finally he cleared his throat, and said, “You gonna grow a pair and ask her out, or is this…” Bucky gestured at the wrecked punching back laying on the floor. “...you being a martyr so I can do it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Buck,” Steve replied.
“I’m talking about the way you’ve been secretly fuming over me spending time with your girl.”
“Darcy isn’t my girl.”
“Maybe not, but I know you well enough to know you want her to be.”
“We’re friends,” Steve said firmly. “That’s it.”
Bucky snorted. “That’s the line you’re taking? Jesus, Stevie, next you’ll be selling me shares of the Brooklyn Bridge.”
“That’s enough, Buck,” he warned. The bag swung wildly on it’s axis as he knocked into it with a quick one two punch.
“Hey, you don’t want to talk about it, we won’t talk about it. She’s not interested in me, though. In case you were wondering. She’s got it bad for someone else.”
Steve felt a blaze of jealousy, hot and thick, bubble up inside him. He fought to keep it out of his voice as he swiped at a drop of sweat rolling down his nose with the back of his hand, and asked, “Oh yeah? Who’s that?”
“Can’t tell. I gave her my word that I wouldn’t say. Besides, I’m not sure you’d approve of the guy. As far as I can tell, he’s got his head stuck up his ass.” Bucky folded his arms over his chest. “Anyway, she’s coming over to my place tonight to make some kind of cheese thing. Blintz, I thinks she called it. You should come too. We’re gonna eat and watch a movie.”
“I’ve got plans,” Steve lied.
“Well if you change your mind…”
“I won’t.”
“Suit yourself. More sexy dame for me.”
Steve’s head snapped up. “I thought you said she wasn’t interested in you.”
“She’s not. Doesn’t mean I can’t look, though. See ya, Stevie.”
Parting shot delivered, Bucky headed out, and Steve was left alone with his punching bag and his rapidly expanding grudge against the nameless guy Darcy had her eye on. He vowed then and there to distance himself. It was hard enough thinking she was sweet on Bucky. Watching her pine over some unknown chump who wasn’t worthy of her was more than Steve wanted to deal with.
Despite this decision, he found himself spending more and more time with her. A lot of it had to do with her buddying around with Bucky so much. They were almost always together after the pizza incident. Steve imagined the constant contact with one of the most deadly assassins on the planet probably wasn’t helping her cause with the mystery guy any. He felt a certain satisfaction with that. He felt even more satisfaction that his own presence very likely held whoever this guy was even further at bay.
So, instead of keeping his distance, Steve moved in closer. As the months passed, the three of them became fairly inseparable. Darcy never brought up the other guy. She seemed content to hang around with him and Bucky, laughing, chattering, and mothering them when she thought they needed it. It was nice. Not what Steve really wanted from her...but nice all the same.
She was good for Bucky, too. Something in Darcy’s personality brought out Bucky’s long-suppressed sense of humor. The two of them were always getting into some kind of trouble. Half the time Steve was bailing them out...and the other half they were talking him into joining them. Which is why the stunt they pulled during his birthday celebrations wasn’t exactly a surprise. The lengths to which they were taking it was a bit beyond what he expected, though.
The dinner was mercifully short as far as banquets go. Steve was able to finish, and make a respectable exit in enough time to catch the Fourth of July fireworks from his hotel room window. Not that he was watching them. The stress, and tedium of the whole week descended on him the moment he was alone. All he wanted to do was stretch out on the king size bed and decompress. Possibly for the next hundred years. The last thing he needed was to be roused by a sharp knock on his door, and Bucky’s voice saying, “Up and at ‘em, Stevie, we’ve still got one more stop on your schedule. Some kind of cake cutting ceremony.”
“What?” He sat up, scrubbing his hand over his eyes. “I don’t remember that.”
“Yeah well, we’re leaving in ten. I’ll meet you in the hall.”
Steve groaned. He’d have canceled it in a heartbeat if it wouldn’t have made him seem ungrateful, but he had a public persona to uphold. Steve Rogers might need a break, but Captain America wasn’t allowed to take them. So he pulled himself together and was up and dressed in the allotted time, tie knotted, jacket of his dress uniform buttoned, and a slight rub mark buffed out of his shoes. He looked every inch a hero, and felt every inch like a weary, lonely man underneath.
At least he wouldn’t be doing it without his friends. The thought of Darcy in her catsuit helped to ease the annoyance a little. Who knew, maybe she’d be wearing something even more outrageous this time. Steve found that he was looking forward to that more than the cake.
When he got out in the hall he saw Bucky still in his USA windbreaker. Darcy was nowhere to be seen. He looked up and down the hall, but it was empty other than the two super soldiers.
“Darce still getting ready?” he asked Bucky, not understanding the smirk he got in reply.
“You could say that.”
Steve glanced down at his watch. “Aren’t we going to be late?”
“Nah. We don’t have far to go. I’m just waiting for…” Bucky abruptly stopped talking, and Steve realized this time he was actually wearing a comm. A comm that he was listening to with an intent look on his face. “Okay, doll,” he said. “I’m on it. Operation Smithsonian is a go.”
“Operation Smithsonian?”
Bucky started walking, and Steve had to move along with him or be left behind. “Yeah. The name was Darcy’s idea. See...” He stopped in front of a door halfway down the hall, and swiped a keycard through the lock. “...I’m delivering a national treasure.”
The lock clicked, and Bucky pushed the door open, holding it for Steve to pass through. Steve paused on the threshold, frowning. “The cake thing is in a hotel room?”
“Why don’t you go in and see,” Bucky suggested. “And for chrissake, Stevie, don’t fuck it up. Your head has been up your ass for far too long already. It’s about time you pulled it out so you could see what’s been right in front of you this whole time.”
Steve was about to reply when he looked through the open door of the room, and everything he planned to say died on his tongue. There was a cake. A big one. More candles than he figured were probably legal decorated it, with one sparkler set into the top blazing away. It wasn’t the cake that caught his attention, though, it was Darcy.
She was holding the cake out on a platter in both hands. The glow from the flames illuminated her skin, turning it warm and rosy. Her hair was pulled back on one side with a silver bow, chestnut curls tumbling down behind her shoulders, and her smiling lips were bright, cherry red. That alone was enough to render him speechless, but when Steve actually made it past her face to see what she was wearing, he forgot to breathe.
Her stockings had silver stars scattered on them, and were held up by a garter belt, over matching panties with the same stars. It took him a second to realize that the only thing she was wearing on top was the cake.
Steve had never been so happy to see a damn cake.
Next to him he could hear Bucky give a low chuckle, and say, “Delivery confirmed, Agent Stripes. He’s all yours.” Then he clapped Steve on the back, and grinned. “Happy Birthday, pal. Be good to her. She’s been waiting a long time for you.”
Somehow Steve got through the door. He assumed Bucky must have closed it, because all his attention was focused on the girl in front of him.
“Happy Birthday, Steve,” she said. “So… You wanna blow out the candles? Or should I?”
Oh he wanted. Badly.
The cake was delicious.
But...
Darcy was better.