Steph Rogers didn't have an easy life. Scratch that, she was satisfied with most parts of her life, and didn't take for granted the privileges she had. She had amazing friends, a great job, and had most parts of her life in order. The only downside was that she was already 23 and still hasn't met her soulmate. She was scarred with the words, "Damn, she is like a fucking chihuahua" , on her fucking body. Her friends found this hilarious and took advantage of this mark at every moment possible.
Many conversations in Steph's life have gone like this:
"Fuck who do they think they are? You can't go to a fucking small party and try to make out with every fucking piss-drunk girl there. Someone is obviously going to call them out! What the fuck?" Steph would have exclaimed, or something similar to this.
"We get it, chihuahua, it was three weeks ago." One of her friends would have inevitably muttered.
Or even sometimes like:
“Man, like she was soo cute. I don’t understand why she doesn't think I’m a chihuahua. Sammy, do you think I’m a chihuahua? I think I’d be a fucking cute chihuahua” She would drunkenly slur, after a few too many shots.
She laughed along because she did understand how mad she can get sometimes. It wasn't easy to deal with her self-righteous anger all of the time, and she gave props to her friends for loving her nonetheless. She also knew how drunk she could get sometimes, which was one of many cons of being short. It was a lot easier to be a lightweight, but at the end of the night her friends would always end up laughing.
It wasn't really a surprise to her when she woke up on her 16th birthday to those words, scribbled on her left shoulder. Before then she was referred to as a chihuahua, but it was a lot more rare for her to hear than now. She remembered her mom, Sarah Rogers, looking at it and laughing about how she already knows she is going to love her daughter's soulmate. Still, she and her mom were glad that it was at least on her shoulder, and she was able to cover it around more conservative family members. One of Steph's best friends, Sam, was stuck with a "Fuck man, I want to ride him into the fucking sunrise.” , on his right hand. It took hours to teach him how to cover it using red lipstick and heavy duty concealer.
Luckily for Sam, he met his soulmate at the ripe age of 19. Riley was the perfect match for him, and Sam only had to deal with the soulmark for 3 years until it thankfully disappeared. Sam met Riley on a night out with the gang, and was rather shitfaced. Everyone was having a good time, sitting in their regular booth and drinking beers, when suddenly Sam zoned out. He suddenly went quiet and made eye contact with this dirty blonde haired man, later revealed to be Riley, for a good minute until another friend of theirs, Natasha, shoved him and almost yelled at him to talk to the man and at least try to get with him. It took a little bit of convincing but Sam definitely didn't end up regretting it, and Steph was happy for him if not a little envious.
Actually, all of her friend have already met their soulmates, and have been able to get rid of those pesky tattoos on their bodies. Natasha and Clint had met a little after Clint’s sixteenth birthday in high school. About a month after his birthday, Natasha had just transferred to their high school and quickly became friends with Steph’s small group of friends. They started dating a few weeks after she transferred, and have stayed together since.
Everyone in her group had known each other since high school, studying at Shield Academy located in Toronto. They stayed close, and slowly each of their soulmates joined. Except for Steph’s, which was the main problem right now.
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Steph was enjoying her well-needed sleep, when suddenly a loud noise woke her up.
BEEP BEEP BEEP
Fuck! She thought. It was already 6 am and she had to get ready for work. She didn’t have to go in till 9 so she had a few hours to get ready and organised before work. She had a rather precise routine in the morning, that had a variety of aspects. She had to get the fuck out of bed first, so she could take a cold shower to properly wake up for work. Then she took a while to do her makeup, because she had to be honest, it was stress relieving. Believe it or not, sometimes waking up and contouring just relieved the tension in her shoulders.
By the time she was done, it was 8:30 and she had to leave. Like now, because it was a half hour transit to where to worked.
She lived alone, after Sam moved out to live with Riley, so thankfully she didn’t need to wake up any roommates for their job, like she often had to when residing with Sam.
Steph worked as a journalist for an online article base. She mainly made articles about different “social justice” type events in the world. She felt as if there needed to be more coverage on some actions that big news media outlets like CNN wouldn’t cover. If there was needed to be a voice to make a change, Steph wanted to step up and be the voice.
Most days she loved her job, but today she was not feeling it. There was so much shit going on in the world, and she honestly wanted to do something to help out more. She wanted to be put there, be in action, risk her life if it meant helping others.
Steph walked to the nearest TTC station, so she could take the subway to Union Station. Thankfully, the weather wasn’t bad and there were no delays. She entered the subway, and sat down on the nearest seat, fucking exhausted. Shit, she thought to herself for around the 10th time already in the day, she had forgotten to get coffee.
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Steph got to work on time, with a few minutes to spare to grab a coffee. She entered the building, and practically ran to the coffee shop located close to the lobby. She needed this coffee. She craved this coffee. She has never felt like she needed anything in her life more than this coffee. Okay, she thought, she might be over-exaggerating a little bit but fuck she forgot to grab a coffee on the way to work and was dog tired.
She arrived at the small coffee shop, located at the corner of the first floor, equipped with a few tables and chairs. She went up to the young barista, who looked around 18, and decided what she was going to order.
“Hi, can I have a small caramel macchiato with a shot of espresso? Thank you.” Steph ordered kindly.
“No problem, your total is $4.68!” The young Puerto-Rican looking cashier, whose nametag read America, replied chirpily.
Steph smiled politely, while going to pay. She walked over to the waiting area and pulled out her phone. She went to text Natasha about her less than a mediocre morning.
Natasha, you’re the type of person to know where the closest cliff to jump off of is. Reply with an address if you have one, directions if not, love you., Steph typed, using her typical fatalistic humour. A rough voice coming near her made her look up from the phone.
“What the fuck do you mean you don’t have any more of the peppermint for my fucking drink! Call your manager I want to have a word with him!” A large man spoke roughly, towards America.
“Sir, I’m sorry but she will not be able to find anymore more of it either. If you want you can try a different one of our holiday drinks.”
“No, you little bitch! I need some fucking mint today and I shouldn’t have to suffer because women are too stupid to fucking find anything!”
What the fuck? Steph thought. This dude was definitely being sexist, and was overreacting! Who does that? Steph was definitely going to let this over-privilege, Charlie Sheen-looking ass have a piece of her mind.
“Full offense but who do you think you are?” Steph asked him rudely, the man towering over her short 5’0 self, “She is not paid to deal with your complete and utter bullshit. Who raised you? You don’t yell and curse people out just because they ran out of your favourite drink!”
“I don’t know why I’m still fucking here. I don’t need two women telling me how to live my fucking life” He muttered, exiting the store.
“Nobody needs your sexist ass here anyways!” Steph called after him, still lowkey confused on how someone could act like that. That was so unrealistic, almost like how a character would act out of one of those wattpad books she would read in high school.
“Thank you so much for that. I’m not really allowed to talk back to customers.” America chuckled, but still seemed appreciative.
Steph smiled in response, tired from all the bullshit this morning. She went back to the area that she was supposed to wait for her drink for, and sighed. She was done with how today was going already. And she still hasn’t had a sip of caffeine yet.
As soon as that thought crossed her mind, another barista yelled out her order. Steph looked and saw the brightest pair of blue eyes that she has ever seen in her life. It was accompanied by a full head of dark brown hair, and pale skin. I need a sip of my fucking coffee, Steph thought in response. It was still too early to deal with such perfection.
She went to grab her order, when Blue Eyes™ jerkily drawled, “Wait! Let me grab you a cookie as a thanks for sticking up for my friend.”
“It’s okay, you really don’t have to. I was just trying to be decent, ya know.” Steph replied, in a daze. She glanced at Blue Eyes™’s name tag. It read “Bucky.” Interesting name, Steph thought to herself.
“No, no let me. It’s the least I can do.” Bucky responded. Fuck, this is it. Steph’s in love, She is 100% certain. Wait no, she thought to herself, I’m just really tired and she’s beautiful. Fuck. Steph knows that her brain definitely does not function properly without coffee and sleep and she knows not to trust herself until she has caffeine intake. But fuck, is she downright gorgeous. Like out of this world beautiful. Steph thought people who looked like this only existed on TV or in movies. She quickly snapped out of her ongoing thoughts, and smiled gratefully. She thanked Bucky quickly, and almost out of the shop.
I really need to go out tonight.
She pulled out her phone and texted her friend’s group chat those exact words. They all responded in agreement, and decided to go to their usual bar. The same one Sam met Riley in. Fuck Steph is lonely.
Steph only then remembered her private messages with Natasha, which read:
Natasha: The Bar. 9:00 tonight. Sent 10 minutes ago,
It’s official. Natasha is psychic.
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In the bar was Sam, Clint, and Steph waiting for Natasha’s arrival. She had said that a friend of hers moved back from living in Russia for a few years about a month ago and she invited her to join them. Steph had calmed down a fair bit since this morning, but was still feeling a bit on edge.
“And then this dude, completely acting like he came out of a badly written fan fiction, starting yelling at the cashier!” Steph recounted for her friends, filling them in on this morning. They groaned, already knowing how this story is going to end.
“Let me take a wild guess. You walked up to him and yelled at him until he shat his pants or did the mental equivalent of it.” Clint replied, sarcastically.
“No! Okay, well yeah kind of. But that’s not it! There was this girl that I swear to god. I have never seen anyone close to this level of perfection!”
“Wow, okay, then what are we to you? Chopped liver.” He acted sadly, jokingly wiping a fake tear off of his face. Clint patted his shoulder comfortingly, playing along with his charade.
“Shhh, let me continue. Okay, so you guys know Angelina Jolie in that movie where she played the young bisexual model who ended up becoming an addict? She was even prettier than that! Like, you know, before the constant drug use and everything.”
“Steph, nobody has seen that movie but you. And I hate to stop your flow, but Nat’s here.” Clint pointed out amicably, towards his fiancee. Beside Nat was, oh fucking shit, Bucky. Steph really hates her life today.
“Oh my god. That’s her. That’s the fucking girl.” Steph groaned, looking around her surroundings for hiding spaces.
“Hey guys” Natasha started, sitting down at the table with her companion, “This is my friend Bucky. She’s kinda new to town.” She introduced, nodding towards Blue Eyes™.
“Hey! I am not new, Nat. I just finally moved back.” Bucky chuckled. “Nice to meet you guys, Natasha talks rather highly of you.”
“Don’t tell them that, then they’ll know I don’t hate them.” Natasha stage-whispered in Bucky’s ear. The group roared with laughter, while Natasha smirked.
“Well, nice to finally meet you Bucky. I’m Sam.” He introduced himself with a friendly smile. “That’s Clint and beside him is Steph.”
“Hey wait, I think I know you,” Bucky replied in Steph’s direction. Oh no. This is it. This is going to be the pinnacle of embarrassment in Steph’s life. She already knows it. “Didn’t you yell at that gross man in the coffee shop today? And call him a ‘Charlie-Sheen looking ass’?”
“That definitely sounds like Steph.” Natasha chuckled. Clint and Sam tried to wink at Steph without being obvious, but it definitely did not work. Steph turned as red as a tomato.
“Yeah haha, that’s me. Nice to officially meet you Bucky.” Steph stammered awkwardly. Fuck.
“Hey now, don’t be embarrassed. It was really brave of you!” Bucky said with admiration, “Although, I have to admit the first thing I thought was that you were like a fucking chihuahua.” She chuckled.
The group froze. Steph felt as if time froze.
“What did you just say?” Natasha said slow and careful.
“Um, that the first thought I had was that she was like a fucking chihuahua? I meant no offense, though. I’m really sorry!” Bucky apologised, still a little confused.
“You, you don’t need to apologise.” Steph stammered out. “I’m, I just think that you, I’m not really sure but you, wait but I don’t kno-”
Sam looked at her for approval first to finish her sentence, and when she nodded he said, “What she is trying to say, is that she thinks you might be her soulmate.”
Realisation, (and was that a hint of happiness?) slowly dawned on Bucky’s face.
“Well, soulmate, nice to meet you,” Bucky smirked. “ Wait.I have a question first. Bucky rolled up her sleeve to reveal a slowly fading tattoo, which said ‘I need a sip of my fucking coffee’ , “Why in the goddamn world did you first think about your coffee?” She exclaimed, while laughing.
The group started to roar with laughter for the second time that night, already.
“Hey! In defence you thought I was a fucking chihuahua!”