The Meaning of Infinity

“Carrie.”

Natasha stood in the doorway, crossing her arms. Carrie looked away from the TV to face her, blinking blearily. Her face was slightly flushed, a glass of whiskey in her good hand. On the screen, a mindless sitcom played. 

“Hey, ‘Tasha,” she mumbled, squinting up at her. Natasha raised an eyebrow- since when were they at nickname stage?

“Getting drunk on a weekday?” Natasha drawled, pushing forward into the living room and walking to stand between Carrie and the television. Carrie didn’t answer, instead looking down at her glass and taking another hurried swig, and Natasha’s eyes narrowed. “You’re acting strange.” 

“I can’t drink?” Carrie grumbled. 

“Sure, you can drink," Natasha replied, easily. "What you can’t do is go to Freeport Village and disable the tracker on your phone.”

Carrie’s lashes fluttered for just a moment, recognition flashing in her eyes. She moved her gaze up from her glass to fixate on Natasha, searching her face as if to check if she might have been lying. 

“Where in Freeport Village?” she asked, urgently. But that was strange, Natasha thought. Even drunk, it would have been a more natural reaction to deny the accusation. Carrie knew very well that she wasn’t supposed to leave on her own, and she even went out of her way to tell Natasha when she was going out, though nobody specifically asked her to. Natasha had always assumed it was her way of displaying that she could be trusted- either that, or Carrie did it out of a sense of paranoia that she might be reprimanded. The fact that one of her clones had left the event today on her own, with no text, had been odd enough. And Carrie certainly knew that she could not disable the tracking on her phone. If she was attempting to run away, it was an extremely sloppy attempt; she’d have been better off leaving the phone behind. And her reaction to Natasha’s accusation didn’t feel like the reaction of someone hiding their own wrongdoings. If anything, she sounded scared. 

“Shouldn’t you know?”

She was testing the waters- and the immediate downward set of Carrie’s lips was very telling. She chewed at the bottom lip, her eyes flickering anxiously down to her hands in her lap. “Hey. Focus. You’re connected to Stark’s network. If your phone was taken from you, you need to tell us.” 

Her fingers froze for a split second So that was it. Somebody had taken the phone? But who? Carrie had barely been on missions, and she had soundly defeated the only enemy who might have held a grudge against her. She didn’t have other enemies, did she? None that Natasha had heard of, that is, if she did. What kind of villains could white collar criminals even piss off? 

“Someone must have stolen it at the event,” Carrie decided, her gaze flickering off to the left as she did.

She was a much worse liar drunk than sober, thought Natasha. “Try again.”

Carrie grimaced. She downed the rest of her whisky, and leant down, setting the glass on the floor and almost tipping off the couch in the process. Natasha caught her at the last second, prepared to berate her, but the words died on her tongue as Carrie looked up again. She looked distraught, Natasha thought. What could have happened?

“Natasha-” Carrie mumbled, her good hand suddenly balling up in the fabric of Natasha’s tank top. She slowly eased her back so that she was sitting properly on the couch again, but Carrie didn’t let go. “Fuck. Never mind.” 

“Why…” Natasha trailed off, then sighed. A brief flicker of frustration came over her face, but it was soon replaced with a more calm sort of curiosity. “Why won’t you tell me?” 

Carrie’s fist tightened in the fabric. She suddenly tugged Natasha closer, her elbow hooking around Natasha’s waist as she buried her face against her torso. Natasha could feel her hand, hanging limply off her back. Unable to grasp it. Natasha froze. 

“Can’t tell. I’ll… I just can’t tell. I wouldn’t run,” she promised, her voice feeble and desperate. “That wasn't it. I’m sorry. Please. I know you hate me.”

Natasha was surprised to find that she almost felt a bit hurt. Would Carrie have told Bruce? Would she tell Tony? It was always odd to have that sudden moment of self-ness where she remembered how to be a person. How to be self-conscious and to worry about the small stuff. Was she really so unapproachable? Did Carrie really think Natasha hated her, still? Did she think Natasha was so cruel that she’d be punished, was that why Carrie texted her when she went out? 

“I don’t hate you. I’m…indifferent,” Natasha replied, her voice almost sounding awkward for once. One of her hands moved to stroke back Carrie’s hair, the other resting gently on her forearm. Carrie snorted slightly and pulled one side of her face back to peek up at her. Natasha only held her gaze for an instant before she looked awkwardly away. Instead, her eyes settled on the whisky bottle, sitting on the floor next to the couch. 

She pulled back. Carrie shrunk in on herself for a moment, but glanced up again when Natasha curled up at the other end of the couch instead of leaving. With her, Natasha took the bottle, drinking straight from the lip. 

“Have I been mean to you?” she asked, once she’d settled in. Carrie thought it over, shifting so that she was facing Natasha fully with her legs curled up to her chest. 

“Cold... not mean,” Carrie replied. Natasha nodded slowly. 

“That’s true. Well, I don’t hate you. I hate…” she paused. It felt oddly vulnerable, talking like this. It was something foreign to her. It was different, having these types of conversations with another girl. It wasn’t like talking to Bucky, or to Tony, or to Bruce. She felt naked. “I don’t like how little you seem to care about your own life, I guess. It…throws me off.” 

“But I’m not dead,” Carrie huffed, eyebrows furrowing slightly. “I’ve never really died.” 

Natasha took another swig, then passed the bottle back to Carrie, who copied her. She passed it back. 

“I know that it’s… different, in a way. But there’s still death and a body. And even if one of you lives, the other is gone.”

Carrie stared down at her hands. She felt the sudden urge to leave. With her inhibitions lowered, she almost threw herself off on the couch right then and there. But the rarity of the moment kept her pinned; she had never had such an honest conversation with Natasha, at least not that she remembered. 

“I remember what you said that day, you know. About the memories,” Natasha continued. “If you die , the other copy doesn’t get them. That means something.”

“Nothing ever goes over your head,” Carrie sighed. Natasha smiled slightly, despite the sombre mood. 

“How can you do it?” She asked. Carrie’s eyes slipped shut, and she leaned back against the arm of the sofa. 

“How? I don’t know. It just makes sense,” she mumbled quietly. “It protects me. It can protect other people, too.” 

“You never hesitate?” Natasha pressed. While Carrie’s eyes were closed, hers were wide open, staring at Carrie as if she might peer into her soul and pick out the truth. 

“No,” Carrie confirmed, a soft smile coming over her features. “If I’m the one who’s ready to take the blow, it will be me. If I’m the one who’s closest to the fire, I’ll run in.”

“What about Vormir? What about the day we took you in?”

“Well, on Vormir… I decided that it’d be the one on the left.”

“But why would she agree?”

“She agreed when we were the same person,” Carrie shrugged. “It could have been me just as easily. But there’s really no difference- without significant time passing as separate entities, we’re the exact same person.”

“And when you were arrested?”

“That was harder,” Carrie admitted. “The copy I shot… she had a good life for the couple of months between the snap and my arrest. She ran the pizzaria with Will, the three of us lived together. It was a blow, knowing that I would never get that chunk of time back. At least I have kind of… second-hand memories of hers. Things she told me.”

“If her life was so good, why did you stay?” Natasha asked. She almost regretted it, as she saw the wince in Carrie’s expression. 

“My role, at the time, was to operate everything,” she said, carefully. “I was the one with the most collective knowledge. About our building, what all of our copies were doing. Hell, about our taxes,” she sighed, peeling her eyes back open. “It didn’t make sense to lose all that.” 

Natasha nodded. For a while, they both sat in silence. Carrie stared at her dried-out, gray hand. Natasha’s gaze settled somewhere on the wall. 

“Carrie?” she asked, after some time had passed. “Whatever went on with you today, you should just tell us.” 

Carrie, who had looked up with interest to hear what Natasha was going to say, shrunk back in on herself, her mouth settling into a grim line. Natasha pressed on. 

“Everyone’s going to help you,” she promised. “Whatever you’re scared of can’t be worse than what we’ve handled in the past.” 

Carrie hesitated. Natasha was right, of course- she knew that. What threat did Elijah possibly pose compared to Thanos? To HYDRA? To any other bad the Avengers had faced before her time? Hell, Carrie didn’t even know what Elijah had been up to all these years. It could have been anything, but it also could have been nothing. Did Elijah go to Freeport Village just to throw off the trail? Or did she live there? Was she broke? Or in a gang? Or was she just… living a normal life? Had she even been using her power? 

But Elijah wasn’t right in the head. That, Carrie knew to be true. And it was a factor which set her on edge, so much that it was impossible to ignore. Elijah had never been all there, not since… 

“Can you trust me to handle this?” Carrie whispered. Natasha’s face fell slightly. She had almost believed they were getting somewhere. But trust had to be earned. Carrie had done more than enough to earn hers, if she was being honest with herself. But what had Natasha done to earn Carrie’s trust? In fact, what had any of them done?

Natasha took a long, cruel sip from the bottle. She didn’t grimace at the taste or the burn, but she did feel it. She stood up, pressing the bottle back into Carrie’s hands. 

“Put that away,” she told her gruffly. “And go back to your room. You don’t want Peter seeing this.” 

Carrie watched her as she walked away, surprised by Natasha’s lack of protest to her non-answer. When she fully processed what she had said, she blinked in surprise, getting up to put away the whiskey- though not before taking another long, deep swig straight from the bottle. 

Maybe she should have just… told her. What harm could it really do? Carrie rubbed roughly at her eyes, trudging back in the direction of the bedrooms. Natasha seemed to have already disappeared there, vacant from the living room as Carrie glanced into it walking by. She stumbled as she looked away from where she was going, smacking into the wall. Before she could fall, though, the wall reached out to steady her. 

“Thanks FRIDAY.” She mumbled, barely registering, and reached out her hand to pat the wall. It caught her wrist. 

“Not FRIDAY.” She looked up, blinking until she recognized who she had actually walked into- and who was now supporting her weight. 

“Thanks, Bucky,” she corrected, looking like a student who has been humiliated by giving the wrong answer in front of her classmates. Bucky raised an eyebrow as she made no move to pull herself off of him. 

“Where the fuck have youbeen?” he mused, straightening her up with a hand on each of her shoulders once it had become clear she wasn’t planning on doing it by herself. She tilted her head, as if confused. 

“Here? The living room?” 

“You got this drunk in the living room ? What about Peter?” Bucky grimaced. He almost seemed to forget his vendetta against her, and real concern poked through his words. Carrie’s head tilted straight again, and then tipped slightly too far the other way, like it was just a bit too heavy for her to hold up. 

“Tha’s what Natasha said,” she sighed. This time, she let her head dip forward, rather than to the side. Bucky’s right arm whipped out on reflex, catching her forehead before it could thud against the vibranium of his left, still extended out to support her. He sucked in a sharp breath, letting it hiss out through his teeth at the close call. 

“I guess that was who banged on my door,” he said, under his breath. He glanced briefly down to see if Carrie would pick up on it, but she just stared back at him. “Come on. It’s time for bed.” 

“I was going already,” she protested, but he just turned, his vibranium arm shifting to brace against her back and keep her upright as he led her back toward her room. He leaned around her to open the door, ushering her inside. For a moment, he hesitated, before stepping in after her. 

“Get pajamas, but don’t put them on yet,” he ordered her firmly, steering her into the closet. He left her there, first scooping up her water bottle from her desk before his feet lead him on a path- one which he strongly felt to be against his will and better judgement- to her bathroom, where he turned on the sink, running his hand back and forth under the water until it was cold. He refilled the bottle. 

When he went back into the room, she was standing in the closet still. She had a pair of pajama pants and a t-shirt in hand- Star Wars themed, with little darth vader helmets on them, he noted with slight amusement. She stared down at them, as if trying to come to some decision. 

“Go on,” he urged her, causing her to startle slightly. “Go change in the bathroom. And brush your teeth.”

“Oh,” she mumbled, and turned fully to face him as she started diligently toward the bathroom. She paused, though, before leaving the closet, and stepped back slightly, fishing blindly for something else in a drawer that was hidden from Bucky by the wall. When she began to move again, he blinked and then flushed, quickly averting his gaze. 

“Jesus, Greenwall,” he hissed. What kind of woman just held up her underwear so plainly in front of a man? Even a drunk girl should know better. 

“What?” she huffed. Her cheeks puffed out slightly. “I’m gonna shower.”

“You’re not,” his embarrassment was forgotten in an instant as he frowned, his head whipping back to face her again. “You’re trashed. You’re gonna drown yourself.” 

“I feel gross,” she pressed, her voice dejected and small. Bucky took in the insistent downward tug of her lip, the redness at the rims of her eyes- had she been crying? He could already feel himself caving in, and he hated it. Why the fuck was he in Carrie’s room, taking care of her? Just because she was wasted? Bucky could pass a million wasted girls on street corners and he’d never given a damn before if they got home safe or drowned in their own showers. And he hated Carrie. He hated her from the beginning, when she’d turned up out of nowhere and died- and died, and died- for nothing. He’d hated catching glimpses of her after he’d been un-dusted. Bucky had felt like only a second had passed, but the sight of her proved him wrong; instead of a beat-down girl in an apron and waitressing uniform, she was an agent. She’d practically been the first thing he’d seen, a copy of her speared straight, and through barely an inch in front of him. Her blood got on his face. 

He hated how she’d jumped on top of Tony. He hated how she’d exploded, burned, melted, combusted, fried before his eyes, an entire ocean of her crashing down in one final wave. He hated the scream of the final copy, eyes rolled back and stumbling ‘til she fell. 

He hated how Tony seemed to grovel in guilt for the weeks that followed. How Bruce stood outside of the medbay. Pacing, anxious, stressed, not ready to mourn and unsure of his place in the visitor’s queue. 

He hated hearing the story of how she’d come to be there. It made him sick. There was penance, and that was one thing. There was being the Winter Soldier and earning your life when you weren’t anymore. The fact that she would sit down, lower her head and accept blackmail for a crime that seemed stupid, in comparison, made him angry. Even now, after sacrificing what must have been thousands of her own lives and a hand, she couldn’t just stand up and fight it? Why in the fuck wouldn’t she fight it? Had she not earned that right by now? 

Bucky sighed. He walked past her, opening the bathroom door again, and stepped inside. She trailed after him, a lost lamb, and watched as he leaned into the shower, turning on the water and testing the temperature until it was a little past warm, but nowhere near hot. He turned back, took the pajamas from her hands, and set them neatly on the toilet seat. 

“I’ll cover my eyes until you get in. If you slip and die between now and then, I’ll kill you,” he snarled. Carrie stood still, processing his words, and then lunged suddenly forward, wrapping her arms around him. He froze, caught entirely off guard, and stayed frozen for a few seconds until the shaking of her shoulders finally processed in his mind. 

“Hey,” his voice was unsure, almost affronted. He tried to fix it. “Hey.” This time, a mite closer to soothing- although it wasn’t quite there. It was more awkward than anything, and her shoulders shook harder. 

“‘Msorry,” Carrie’s voice was muffled in his shirt. “I’m drunk.” 

“I know,” Bucky replied. “It’s, uhm. Alright.” 

Carrie sniffled, pulling back, and wiped at her eyes as she avoided Bucky’s gaze. 

“Stupid Elijah. Stupid to go after her,” she muttered to herself, her voice barely audible through her hands as they scrubbed at her face. Bucky almost pressed her to elaborate, but thought better of it. 

“Come on. I’ll close my eyes,” he repeated, already shutting them and pressing his palms over his face for good measure. After a beat, he could hear the rustling of Carrie’s clothes as she tugged them off and dropped them to the floor. 

“I’m in,” she told him, the clinking of the curtain rings confirming her statement as she pulled the shower curtain back shut. Bucky opened his eyes again, and sank down to sit on the floor against the wall. 

“I’m serious. Better not die,” he told her, his voice weary. He let his forehead rest against his knees. 

“I survived worse,” she grumbled back. There was no amusement in her voice. If anything, it sounded regretful. 

Bucky wasn’t sure if he agreed. 

When she stumbled back out of the shower, tugging on the pajamas while Bucky once again squeezed his eyes shut, it’d been silent for a while. In a weird way, Bucky found he hadn’t felt uncomfortable. Even with her in the shower, and even knowing who he was with. He peeled his eyes back open only when he could hear her brushing her teeth, then followed her out as she swayed back into her room and headed for the bed, ready to catch her should she fall. 

“You’re not so bad,” she murmured as she flopped back onto the bed. She squinted up at him, her eyes still heavy with delirium. Bucky’s face warmed slightly. 

“Oh, yeah?” he remarked back, his voice bland but slightly tight. She studied him. 

“Yeah… you know? I feel less scared,” Carrie sighed. She turned over, dragging herself further onto the bed. Her voice became muffled as her face became buried in the comforter. “I think you’d help me with Elijah.” 

Scared? Bucky frowned. Why was she scared? Who was Elijah? She’d said that name before, when she’d been crying. Bucky had written it off the first time; he wasn’t about to go prying into Carrie’s business. She was the last person he wanted to be helping, but…

“Who’s Elijah? Who are you scared of?” he pressed, voicing his inner concerns. Carrie turned her cheek to the mattress so that she could look up at him again from the corner of her eye. 

“Elijah’s me. No. She’s my sister,” she answered mechanically. Now that she was lying down, she seemed less conscious and coherent, like she was already half asleep. Bucky’s brow furrowed and his lips tugged insistently lower. “I think she mighta stole my phone. But I don’t know.” 

“You don’t know?” he pried, inching closer to the edge of her bed without really meaning to. His brow knit firmly into itself. 

“Prob’ly killed me,” Carrie sighed. Her lips pursed into a half-pout. “I sent me to follow her, buttt… ugh. I don’t know. Don’t remember. So, dead, prob'ly.” 

Bucky;s gut twisted, and he leaned down, grasping her shoulder to keep her awake a moment longer. He was going to pry further, asking for more details while Carrie was in a… sharing mood- but she giggled, her eyes fluttering open slightly, and caught his wrist, tugging him so that he was pulled onto the mattress by her side. She curled up next to him, not letting go. Bucky went rigid. 

“Hey,” he protested sharply, but the nuance of his tone fell on deaf ears. 

“Hey,” Carrie replied, her eyes slipping shut again. She hummed to herself, seemingly contemplating something. Bucky waited, debating if he should just tug himself free and run off, but his decision-making process was cut short as she seemed to come to an internal decision. “You’re strong, right? You can…” (-She was cut off by a yawn)- “You can help me with Elijah. Don’t let her…”

She yawned again, squirming into a more comfortable position and brushing closer to Bucky in the process. He froze, his own eyes squeezing shut as an unwelcome feeling bubbled up from his gut. 

“Don’t let her do what?” he pressed urgently, ignoring the small flash of endearment and concern that had struck him. “What will she do?”

“Dunno,” Carrie mumbled, clearly already surrendering to sleep. “She's just… crazy. Like Richard Chase.”

Bucky was distracted slightly by the bizarre reference, and by the time he brushed it off, she was well asleep. He sighed, conflict bashing at the back of his skull as he tried to reconcile his mounting concern with his resolute hatred for Carrie. Again he considered pulling free and sneaking off back to his own room- it wasn’t like he would wake her up, as dead to the world as she was- but something stopped him. He studied her face carefully; in sleep, he could imagine it to be as dead as he had seen it a hundred times, now. It wasn’t quite as peaceful, somehow, the soft rise and fall of her chest too busy to match up with the cold, unmoving grace of her countless corpses. He felt the back of his throat tighten at the thought, and subconsciously, his hand tightened slightly where it was still splayed over her shoulder. 

“Elijah,” he mumbled to himself, rolling off his side to lay flat on his back. He stared up at the ceiling. He was so deep in thought, he barely felt it as Carrie clung more firmly to his arm, and didn’t notice as he was taken by his own fatigue beside her. 

***

Waking up with Bucky Barnes asleep in bed beside her had not been on Carrie’s bingo card for the year, or probably forever. 

Her instinct was to shove him away, or maybe just to throw herself down to the floor. She was halted, though, by the steady rise and fall of Bucky’s chest. If he had ever looked so peaceful, she knew she hadn’t seen it- in her mind, Bucky was only… angry, disgruntled, and mean. 

Well, he’d certainly proven he could be nice last night, Carrie thought. She had been drunk, of course, but not enough to black out. She flushed slightly as she recalled Bucky waiting outside of the shower for her, but she shook the thought away. At least he hadn’t seen her change. 

She hadn’t meant to pull him down, and she really hadn’t meant to fall asleep beside him. But somehow, she felt grateful. She had been shaken, more than she would have admitted to herself, by the sudden appearance of Elijah. It had taken all of her willpower not to tell Natasha about Elijah, and…

Fuck. She’d blabbed to Bucky almost right after. It had probably been a poor choice to drink even more after begging Natasha to let her handle her own problem, but it wasn’t as if she’d expected to run into anyone else. Her jaw tightened, an odd mix of apprehension and relief flooding through her at the realization of what she had shared. 

Elijah. Little sister. Little doll. Carrie swallowed, her throat suddenly feeling thick with phlegm, or maybe bile. How could Carrie have known she was alive? The last time they’d seen each other, Elijah was… well, she looked dead. Gun in hand and shaking as the blood poured from the gashes in her skin, a long chunk of glass protruding from her gut…

Carrie gagged slightly, her hand moving to clamp over her mouth. She rolled over, curling in on herself to face away from Bucky. His hand, which had somehow remained draped over her upper arm throughout the night, fell away from her. He froze, his eyes flying open as instinct kicked in. She barely noticed, shaking slightly as she was. 

“You alright?” Bucky mumbled, the flash of concern overtaking the instinctual alertness of being awoken by the motion of another. His voice was rough with sleep, his eyes flickering nervously over her. He sat up.

She didn’t answer, besides a small shake of her head. Tentatively, Bucky reached around her. He pulled her hand from her mouth, and straightened her out slightly, tugging her to sit up like he had. She complied, not resisting him, until she was upright. Her arms moved instinctually to hug around her torso. 

“Shake it off,” he told her, his voice so quiet it was almost a whisper. She nodded, breathing slowly, in and out. A moment passed, and then another, as she regained composure. As she did, the realization of where he still was dawned on Bucky, and he began to feel a bit awkward. 

“I’m- sorry for staying. I didn’t even… I didn’t realize I was falling asleep,” he mumbled, not meeting her eye. Carrie tugged the sheets up around her waist, her fists balling up in the fabric. 

“It’s… well, it’s okay. Sorry for… being so drunk. You didn’t have to help.”

Bucky eyed her carefully. Slowly, he moved his hands away, dropping them awkwardly in his lap as he watched her get her bearings. His mind was racing, though somehow it still felt frozen. More than anything, he wanted desperately to know what was in Carrie’s head right now. Was she upset, uncomfortable, angry? Was she scared? Did she remember what she’d told him? What she’d done?

His face felt a bit warm as his looping train of thought circled back to the instant she had grabbed him, tugging him to bed. He hoped it didn’t show across his cheeks, speaking up again in an attempt to ignore the thought. 

“Do you remember what you asked me?” he blurted out, wincing a second after as he heard his own tactless question. 

Carrie’s lips thinned as they tightened together. Her throat bobbed as she swallowed nervously. “Just forget it. It’s not… I don’t need the help.” 

It was clear to Bucky she didn’t really believe it, but he waited for a second. This was one of those situations where it was obvious some amount of tact was required, and he was self-aware enough to know that he had little to none, generally. This conversation required care. 

“You sounded… nervous, yesterday,” he settled on saying. Carrie squirmed under his scrutinizing gaze, clearly not willing to admit to his accusation. Bucky waited a moment longer, then deflated slightly. Why was he giving in so fast? He normally would have pressed her harder, he thought- in these situations, his instinct was to treat every conversation like an interrogation. Somehow, though, he knew he’d always looked at Carrie differently than he looked at other people. In his mind, she was too… soft for things like that. Realistically, he knew she was just as much an Avenger as the rest of them. Hell, she threw herself into fatal situations without so much as blinking, something he himself even hesitated to do. But something about her personality just irked him. She wasn’t rough-edged the way the rest of them seemed to be. She wasn’t mean or bitter or angry. She was just… she always seemed so…

“Come on. I’ll make you breakfast,” Bucky grumbled. He was already pulling himself off of the bed, pulling back his shoulders slightly to stretch out the odd kink in his muscle from sleeping on a mattress, rather than flat on the floor like he was used to. She stared after him, almost confused, before she pushed herself up to follow. 

***

They didn’t speak while Bucky was cooking. Somehow, it didn’t feel that awkward. 

He moved with grace around the kitchen. Carrie had noticed it once before, back in Wakanda. That had been weeks ago now, but somehow it still felt all-too recent. And that had been uncharacteristically kind, too, she realized now- even if he’d been a little bit of an asshole about it. And, of course, despite what he had said to her and Bruce.

“You’re a really good cook,” she told him, as he placed the first plate in front of her and returned to the stove to finish frying his own egg. “Where’d you learn?”

“Probably a hundred years ago,” he grunted in return, taking his own plate to the stool across from her. “Used to cook for my younger sister, growing up.”

Carrie nodded, falling awkwardly back into silence. She hadn’t known that Bucky’d had a sister, too. Bucky seemed to realize what he’d said a split second too late, glancing nervously to gauge Carrie’s reaction. He still wasn’t sure about… Elijah. Carrie’d said she was her sister, very briefly, and he still didn’t know what had happened between the two. He ate quietly, internally mustering up the nerve to question her again, but the two were interrupted before he could voice his concern. 

Carrie had never been more grateful to handle her alcohol well. It was already bad enough that she and Bucky had barely been eating for ten minutes before they were silently joined by Peter, Bruce, and Tony- in that order. Having a hangover would have been the icing on the cake. Peter hadn’t seemed too alarmed to see her and Bucky eating together, at least- she hadn’t said much to him regarding the state of her relationship with any of the team members, good or otherwise. He did shoot a look between them, though, and Carrie silently prayed that he had been asleep last night when she had been caught drunk in the hall. If he’d been awake, he surely would have heard her through the walls. 

Bruce had been a different story. He’d stopped in his tracks half-way through the kitchen door, taking a full glance back and forth at the two of them- and one brief look at Peter, whose head was buried in the cupboard- before he’d continued moving into the kitchen to begin preparing his own breakfast. 

“Good morning,” he mumbled, his voice tinged with curiosity, and squeezed one over-sized hand over Carrie’s shoulder as he passed behind her. Bucky’s eyes zeroed in on the subtle contact, his jaw tightening reflexively before he pushed the momentary annoyance away. He had found Bruce’s puppy-crush on Carrie sickening since the time he had first puzzled it out, and nothing about that had changed, even if he was feeling oddly neutral towards Carrie for once when he usually would have been unwelcoming to her presence. 

“Morning,” Carrie squeaked out in reply, not missing the flash of annoyance on Bucky’s face. She found she wasn’t bothered by it as she usually would have been. She had never understood why Bucky felt the need to poke his nose into her business, even less so why he was so judgemental of it, but suddenly she almost felt like she had to explain herself. Don’t get carried away, she reminded herself. He hates you.You slept in the same bed, it’s not like you fucked him.

She almost choked on a forkful of egg as that thought crossed her mind. Quickly, she shoved it to the very back of her skull, burying it away under other concerns. 

Tony followed soon after with Morgan in tow. Just as Bruce and Peter had found their own seats- Bruce opting for the stool on Carrie’s left, and Peter filling in the one across from him, as if to even out their placement around the counter- they sidled out of the elevator, looking up at the others with far more joy than the rest of them were currently experiencing. 

“Don’t the bunch of you look somber,” he joked, as he glanced between the four silent faces picking at their plates. The glances back at him dampened his glee- it was clear he hadn’t been far-off. 

“Alright, jeez. Just eat, then,” he huffed. “Morgan, what’re we going for today?”

Morgan bounced over to the fridge, opening it up and beginning her list of nonsensical ingredient suggestions for breakfast. Carrie listened absent-mindedly, preferring to tune out her own anxieties with the babbling of a child. Next to and across from her, Bruce and Bucky continually glanced at each other- every once in a while making eye contact that was sometimes swiftly broken, and sometimes held with contempt a little while longer. 

“Charity gala tonight,” Tony reminded Carrie, as he and Morgan finished up their concoction and sat to eat. Carrie nodded numbly. Her presence at these galas and high-profile cocktail parties had been even more in-demand after the war, and the last thing she wanted right now was a full schedule. But who was she to refuse? That wasn’t how it worked here, and she knew it. 

“Right. I just forgot where,” she mumbled, barely glancing up at him over her coffee. Tony frowned, not missing her unusually dampened demeanor. 

“Pierre,” he answered, slowly. From across the table, Peter leaned forward to glance at her, too. Under the added scrutiny, Carrie pulled herself up slightly, forcing a smile. 

“Great. Are we going late, or early?” Early, of course, meant ‘slightly late’ when it came to Tony. He hummed in contemplation. 

“Early, I guess. But you should get there first, since I think they might want to have you say a few words during the opening. I’ll get you a car.” 

“I can go with you, if you have to leave early.” It was Bruce who spoke up. He’d been huddled over his breakfast next to Carrie mostly without a word since he’d sat down. Bruce could always tell when she was in a mood, and she looked worse for wear now than he’d seen her in a while.

Carrie chewed at her lip. “Sure, maybe.” It wasn’t much of an answer- short and non-committal. “I might get ready with Natasha.” 

Bruce paused at this. If Natasha and Carrie had become friends, it was certainly a new development to him. He had been a bit busy recently with his work, he supposed- not seeing Carrie quite as much as he usually did- but he might have thought one of them would have mentioned it to him if they’d suddenly become closer.

“Yeah, Brucie, don’t steal my date.” Natasha pushed into the room, waving briefly to Tony. She looked curiously at Bucky, her eye catching on the remnants of his and Carrie’s breakfasts- same meal, one cook, she thought triumphantly. She looked up, ready to catch Bucky’s sheepish expression as he watched her puzzle out what had gone down, but he was a step ahead of her, standing up and turning away before she could. She didn’t miss the way he leaned across the table first, collecting Carrie’s dishes with his own. If anyone else had been finished, he might have taken theirs too, but she knew better. 

Natasha sidled into the seat straight across from Carrie, taking the opportunity as Bucky vacated it. She stole away Carrie’s mug and took a long sip of the coffee; Carrie looked relieved to see her arrival, a small smile forming on her lips. 

“I could just get you your own,” she said, her voice good-natured but still quiet. 

Natasha’s smile widened. “Would you, dear?” 

Carrie stood and went back to the coffee machine. Bruce glanced between them, almost helpless. First Bucky, now Natasha? Was he suddenly thrust into an alternate dimension? Was there an alien duplicate that had replaced Natasha? Or even Carrie? Since when were they so buddy-buddy? 

Carrie’s hip bumped accidentally into Bucky’s as she moved around him to get to the cabinet of mugs. 

“Sorry,” she mumbled, ducking her head away from him. Bucky glanced down at her, a small frown on his lips- not the cruel sneer Bruce was used to him flashing her, but a more concerned expression. 

“S’alright,” he mumbled back. Bruce felt his despair gurgling higher in his throat as Carrie flashed him a small smile in return. 

She returned with the coffee, sliding it over to Natasha as she sat back down. She glanced nervously at Bruce, and then at Tony, before taking another long sip from her own mug, then looked back at Natasha. 

“Did you…” Carrie began hesitantly, intending to ask whether Natasha had alerted anybody to the incident they had discussed the day before, but Natasha cut her off.

“No,” She answered, curtly. Clearly she knew what Carrie was going to ask about before she could even voice it. “I did not.” 

Carrie relaxed immediately, another small smile- this one a clear indicator of some relief or gratitude- coming over her lips. She tapped the nails of her right hand against the side of her mug, all at once; her fingers didn’t bend the right way anymore to do it with only one. 

“Thank you. Really.” Bruce picked at his cereal, curiosity itching at him insistently. Not so long ago, he had been Carrie’s only real friend on the team, and now…

“Oh. Can Will come, too?” she added, glancing hopefully over at Tony. Although Natasha hadn’t blabbed to anybody about the phone going missing, she had never verbally promised to let Carrie handle the situation on her own. It was better to drive with Natasha than Bruce, who didn’t know why Carrie was feeling off- but it would be even better to drive with Natasha and a buffer. Civilian buffer. 

Natasha’s mug, half-way back to the table after being lifted, sped up its course and connected with a slightly too-sharp thunk. Tony considered the request, oblivious to the minute reaction. 

“Will’s never been to… stuff like that, has he? Will he be okay?” Peter interjected, confusion lacing his tone. Carrie had barely brought Will around to the tower, let alone try to ask if he could come with them to an Avenger’s event. Even with no real media training, Peter was intelligent enough to consider that bringing Will, who was not in the least bit a known public figure, would spark all sorts of rumors. 

Tony seemed to think the same. “I thought you really weren’t dating?” 

“No! We’re not,” Carrie replied quickly, faltering slightly under the instant scrutiny from Bruce, next to her, as well as Bucky, where he stood above the counter. 

“So you just hate hanging with us?” he laughed, "You need a buffer?" Carrie shook her head, frowning, although his guess had been pretty on the nose. 

“I just was thinking of him, that’s all,” she defended. Tony accepted a piece of banana pushed his way by Morgan, adding it on top of his egg and toast and fighting not to wince as he tested her newly invented combination. 

“Have him come by after,” Tony told her. “This gala’s probably a little bit too much for baby’s first ballroom .” 

Carrie nodded, accepting his answer without fuss. It had been a poorly thought-out request, anyway; She wasn't even sure if Will had a suit. Across from her, Natsha lifted her mug once more, her eyes trained on Carrie over its rim. 

“And if you need a date that bad, make Bucky take you,” Tony added, a glimmer of mischief in his tone. Natasha’s eyes crinkled, then, though her smile was mostly hidden by her mug. Next to Carrie, Bruce’s spoon scraped slightly on the bottom of his bowl. By the sink, Bucky’s posture went rigid. 

“I’m sure he doesn’t want to-”

“Sure,” Bucky murmured, just as Carrie was about to shoot down the idea. Her head whipped up to stare at him, wide-eyed, as did Bruce’s. Natasha took another sip of coffee. 

“So quick to abandon me,” she chided playfully, though Carrie knew she didn’t mind. In fact, (although her face was relatively neutral, as always), Carrie thought she seemed positively thrilled. It had been her machination, after all, which had forced Carrie onto Bucky the previous night. She remembered what Bucky had mumbled- something about knocking on his door. Carrie doubted she had involved him for any personal reason, though- it had probably been her way of trying to keep whatever situation Carrie was dealing with under a watchful eye without meddling directly. After all, Carrie had asked Natasha to leave it alone- not Bucky. Well, not yet.

“Oh, well- I can go with-” Carrie began, avoiding Bucky’s eyes and fidgeting restlessly with the fingers on her dead hand, but Natasha cut her off. 

“It’s fine, I’ll go with Bruce,” she hummed, not seeming concerned in the slightest. “We can still get ready together. I didn’t really want to get there too early, anyway.”

Bruce finished the last bite of his cereal, overly-tense. As soon as he’d let his spoon clatter back into the bowl, Bucky moved away from the counter, leaning over the kitchen island to pick it up and add it to the pile of dishes he’d been scrubbing at in the sink basin. The movement almost seemed passive-aggressive, and Bruce certainly took it that way, glaring harshly at Bucky’s back as he retreated again. Tony, on the other hand, didn’t seem to notice. He scooped up his own empty plate, catching Bucky’s arm on the turn around to add it to the pile. 

“Thanks, Barnes,” he grinned. Bruce huffed.

***

Remaining in the kitchen until everybody else had gone turned out to be a chore. Bucky had initially not wanted to let Carrie out of his sight- well, initially, he had planned to grill her over breakfast. Now, the rest of the team seemed to be milling about with no intention of leaving, and Carrie seemed ready to flee at any moment. When she finally did, Bucky gave up on occupying himself with the dishes, following after her. 

“Is he…” Bruce began nervously, after both of them had disappeared, but his question was silenced by a falsely-sympathetic smile from Natasha. 

“What?” Tony asked, glancing up from where he and Morgan had settled on the floor, playing some pretend game with various plastic bottles of kitchen spices. He glanced back at Morgan, clasped his hands over her ears, and then looked back up at the kitchen island, a stupid smile on his face. “You think they’re fucking?” 

“Uhg, Mr. Stark!” Peter burst out, half-way through the door to return to the kitchen after he had gone to his room to get ready for the day. He frowned, a disturbed look on his face. Tony laughed, loud. 

“I don’t- well- that wasn’t what I was going to say ,” Bruce stammered, his green face tinged slightly darker at the cheeks. 

“But it’s what you meant, ” Tony laughed. Peter groaned, hanging his head and pushing past them to head for the elevator. 

“Seriously disgusting,” he grumbled. “Don’t ever say that again.” 

In the next room over, and making a bee-line for the hallway where everybody’s rooms were, Bucky sighed, tuning out the conversation. Sometimes super-senses felt much more like a curse than a blessing. 

He turned the corner, catching sight of Carrie’s hair bouncing behind her as she herself made a bee-line directly for her door. 

“You’d better not be running off,” he called after her, not bothering to raise his voice. Her hand, which had been grasping desperately for her door-knob, stilled there and white at the second knuckles, below where the skin was permanently grayed.

“Running from what?” she squeaked, pivoting on her heel to face him. He kept on walking toward her until he was nearly taking up her own space. He pried her hand off of the door handle, and she let it fall lamely to her side. 

“Natasha’s pretty shady for getting me involved in this,” he grumbled, crossing his arms. Carrie shifted her weight between her feet. “And pretty smart. Obviously something happened, and you’re not going to get away with shoving it under the rug.” 

“Is that why you agreed to go to the gala with me?” Carrie huffed, but Bucky didn’t react. 

“Yes. You’re either going to tell me in the hallway, or in one of our rooms, or at the gala tonight, so make up your mind. Keeping your mouth shut isn’t an option.”

“Why do you even care?” she shot back, petulant. She felt oddly like a child being scolded for a mess they had made, rather than someone on a team of super-agents who had an equally super-enemy (probably) out to get them. 

At this question, Bucky did have a bit of a reaction. He opened his mouth, closed it again, and then sighed from deep in his chest. His metal fingers flexed slightly where they were resting in the corner of his opposite elbow. 

“I care because I found you wasted in the hallway,” he finally replied, his voice tight. “Shaken-by-something wasted, not party-wasted. And because apparently, you have a super-sister running around who you described as ‘crazy like Richard Chase.’ Isn’t that the Vampire of Sacramento?” 

Carrie’s nose wrinkled at the reminder of what she had said the previous night, while she had been drunk and loose-lipped. And, apparently, very tactless. 

“Uh… yeah,” she mumbled, answering only the last question so she could think about some kind of rebuttal against him. “He is.” 

“So you compared your sister to a cannibalistic serial killer. And don’t think I forgot what you asked me after,” he added, his crossed arms tightening slightly over his chest. Carrie swallowed, averting her gaze to study the paint on the opposite wall. 

“It’s really fine,” she mumbled, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t need protecting. I was drunk.” 

Bucky felt his chest tighten. He uncrossed his arms, letting them fall to his sides. They hung there awkwardly, and, as if trying to naturally balance out the level of discomfort between them, Carrie picked up her own awkwardly hanging arms, and crossed them. Only one of them could be open. Only one of them could push through. She would make sure of that; that no matter what Bucky tried to pull from her, and what she was forced to share, the chasm which stopped him from caring enough to get involved would remain between them. No rope bridge. 

Bucky’s heart sank, replaced by some other substance that clutched at his throat and rose to his lips like bile. Whatever gap had separated them so far, it had always been there- and he had been perfectly content with that. He had even encouraged it. But something had obviously changed. As deep as Bucky typically was in his own self-denial and stubbornly forced delusions, something was stopping him from clinging to them now.

Before he could think of what to do, his arms were catching hers and unfolding them again. She stared up at him, surprised, and then gently tugged his wrists from his grasp. 

“Let me get dressed first,” she mumbled, and was gone into her room. He stood there outside her door, staring at it for almost a full minute, before he ducked into his own door, just one down, to do the same.