i.
Through the plethora of failed and tried relationships, Daisy always ended up alone.
Sometimes lonely, sometimes detached from the world that burned her too many times, nonetheless, she was always just Skye.
A single entity that she created for herself, a piece of home that she gave herself, a piece of protection. A girl with no home, and a girl with no one ever willing to stay long enough to know she's not named Skye.
So, it was weird after all these years as a proudly independent person to be in a fully functional relationship. She'd traveled to different dimensions, planets, galaxies, even timelines but somehow a solid, loving relationship almost seemed more foreign.
This thing with Daniel was no longer just a measly figment of her imagination or something she experienced in the confines of a time loop months ago. It was a relationship, a real one. Real enough that they were even living together after dating for only a handful of months.
Weird right?
She thought so.
After the team's disbandment, the only two left were Daisy and Sousa.
"So, what do we do now?" He asked.
"I guess, live?"
Earnestly Daniel said, "I don't want to sound too forward, but I don't want to do that with anybody else."
Ever the gentlemen, she thought. A shy Daisy responded by threading their fingers together. This was new, and this was different. She looked at him, and she knew he meant every word. There's a certain look Daniel had when he gazed at her. It felt like a piece of home she'd found in Coulson, May, FitzSimmons, Mack, and Yoyo. He almost reminded her of fragments of herself before she became Daisy. Unexpectedly finding a home in something, someone, when they weren't even looking for it.
"Well, you're lucky I'm free." She joked then took a beat. "I wouldn't want to be with anybody else too."
ii.
They currently lived in an apartment in L.A. While it was big enough for the two of them neither of them lived with another person in such close quarters.
Daniel had been a bachelor for years before and after Peggy. Of course, he had a few entanglements over the years, but nothing ever serious enough to settle down and share a life with someone.
He attempted pushing himself out of his four-way 90-degree angled ways, but unfortunately, nobody had a chance in hell of snuffing out the torch he held for a certain British dame.
Then a pretty blonde time-traveling superhero blew up his entire life, literally. Have you seen her powers?
Since the moment he found her commanding space in his office, he had no damn idea what was in store for him. In the meantime, the world zipped right passed 1955 and landed in 2020.
But in those phases of confusion was crisp clarity.
Daisy.
In many ways, she was like all the people he'd known in his life rolled into one intricate, complex package.
Daniel found comfort in her familiarity. But in ways he knew her type, there were also parts of her he couldn't read. Not for the better lack of trying. She was an anomaly, that much was true. And she wore that independence like her fresh purple bruises and discolored scars all over her body.
He noticed it in the little things.
Most nights, they'd fall asleep embracing each other, but in the middle of the night, she'd detach from him and scoot her way to her respective side of the bed.
There was nothing wrong with that. But she would tug on the bed sheets like she's fighting for her life. At one point, she almost knocked Daniel out of their bed by accidentally pulling the sheets so hard she quaked him in her sleep.
He realized she's probably never shared a bed with anyone in quite a long time. And neither had he if he was honest.
iii.
A few weeks later, Daisy insists on making Daniel a home-cooked meal for all the accidental "sleep quaking" she calls it.
He sits in their living room adjoining into the kitchen, completely amused and entranced at a modern-day superhero struggling to use a can opener.
"Are you sure you don't need any help?"
"No, I'm okay."
He winces as she misses the crevice of the can and almost nicks her thumb.
"You know I can't concentrate when you're sitting over there making all those faces." She says exasperatedly.
"And I wouldn't be making all those faces if you knew how to properly use a can opener without cutting off one of your fingers." He retorts.
Daisy's rolls her eyes, clearly annoyed. It is truly absurd that she can fight time-traveling aliens but can't cook. She throws the defective opener in the trash. What's even better than a can opener? Duh her powers. Of course, she should've seen this coming because of how cursed she is in the kitchen. The instant she quakes the can, it explodes like she's a damn cartoon character continuously stuck in a loop of misfortunate events.
The thick paste covered her from her head to her midriff. It also slightly spattered the surrounding patches of their white walls.
A startled Daniel instantly gets up from their couch, eyeing his comically drenched girlfriend, his mouth hanging equally as low as Daisy's.
A few short seconds pass and Daniel's boisterous laugh fills their apartment.
It's all so ridiculous Daisy can't help but laugh too.
He walks over to the infected territory and examines the damage.
He takes a step back and just gazes at her. The pause runs too long, and Daisy interrupts, "Daniel, what are you doing?"
He doesn't respond, but he shapes his fingers into what Daisy thinks is a makeshift camera. He places his hands above his eye, and his right index finger presses down takes an imagery photo. He even mimics the clicking sound. "I'm taking a mental photo of how impossibly adorable you look right now."
Oh, he thinks this is all so funny. She grabs the dishtowel hanging on the oven door and starts lightly whipping him with it. "Oh, I'll show you adorable."
There it is, again, his hearty laugh. And it fills her up with so much joy it almost hurts. Even though she’s covered in her god-awful attempt at cooking, she's impossibly happy. Daisy knew it had everything to do with Daniel.
iv.
A new assignment from a very secretive Nick Fury arrives for them after they hit the six-month relationship mark.
When Daisy reaches out to Mack, he describes it as "all the shit we did in space but just make it fancy."
L.A. flourished into somewhat of a real home for the couple, but Daisy knew they both were always going to be agents first, no matter what. They shared the same love of protecting the marginalized, and well the world. Now space too, she guesses.
Packing for a trip in space with no end date was difficult. They both didn't have much to their spy names but there were still some important items Daisy wanted to take with her.
Let it be known, she wasn't the sentimental type in the slightest, but she did keep a journal filled with photos of the team and some personal thoughts about their time together. Okay, maybe that made her a nostalgic sap. She groans, Daniel's turned her into such a melt.
"Daniel, can you get my notebook from inside my nightstand?"
The corner of her lips twitches when she hears a faint, "yes, dear." She’d caught him call her that sometimes. Yes, it's old-timey and odd, and yes, called him a loser for it, but it was growing on her. It reminded her of Lucy and Desi. The thought that they've reached that level of domesticity strangely didn't freak her out.
Daniel strolls in the living room with the journal and a photo. "Hey, do you mind me asking who this is?" He turns the photo to face her, and her faint smile drops.
Instantaneously, Daniel realizes he's stepped on a metaphorical land mine without recognizing it. Wanting to reverse the last five seconds he tries apologizing. "Daisy, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have been so insensitive."
She slumps onto the couch and pats the space next to her. He cautiously walks over to her not wanting to set her off more than he already had. She reassures him, "No, it's okay, I promise."
She reaches for the picture of a very alive Lincoln and herself in an embrace. Jemma took this one in a moment of peace before all of the chaos waiting for them in the coming months.
Daniel understood that Daisy had a complicated life, which was the understatement of any century. He never pushed her to share more than she'd felt comfortable in their conversations. He knew that she suffered numerous losses. Just in the month he had met her, her mother died and her supposedly dead sister, Kora, was alive.
Mack spelled it out for him. She lost a person close to her, somebody she loved. And this somebody was the guy he so stupidly asked her about.
Daniel starts. "Daisy you don't have to..."
Daisy brushes his protest off with a pained smile. "But I want to."
She faces him directly, and she can feel the concern in his always gentle, forgiving eyes. His special worry over her was never overwhelming or patronizing.
"This was Lincoln." She says clearly. "He was the first Inhuman I met. He helped me understand who I was, what I was. Somewhere along the way, we got together. Long story short, he ended up sacrificing himself for me. He died for me while we were on our way into becoming something good."
She huffs, "There are days I know I loved him, and then there are other days I feel like I substituted the guilt I felt for love to get through the grief of it all."
She'd never told anyone that last part of her confession.
Unable to still keep the eye contact with Daniel, she looks back down the photo.
"Hey," Daniel says softly.
She turns her head back at him, and she's met with his arms.
He didn't want her to feel guilt for admitting what had plagued her for years. This was just a part of the complicated journey of getting to know someone.
He caresses her back and whispers a soothing, "Thank you."
"For what?" She says equally as low.
He pulls away from the hug and sweeps a gentle brush on her warm cheek. "For being so brutally you—honest, unrelenting in your love for others to the point it hurts you so bad you can barely even speak about it."
He continues lowly. "Oh, to be loved by you like that. I know that's how I feel about you."
She didn't even know how to react to words so heart-achingly soul-bearing. So, she kisses him and hard.
Daisy's never told anybody she loves them, but if this feeling was what all the songs and movies screamed about, well, damn she might just be a hopeless romantic masquerading as a cynic.
v.
It's Christmas on Z3, or actually Christmas on Earth. After years in space with Shield, Daisy still has no idea how anyone keeps track of time here. The days eventually begin to blend together when they're in the void of the universe.
But she was determined to make this the best first Christmas together for her makeshift family of Kora, Daniel, and herself.
So, she enlisted one of her agents to decorate Z3. She helped out along the way because she couldn't help but feel giddy about this holiday. It was special when you have people to share it with. The two closest people to her, her sister and boyfriend, were both ripped out of time. She wanted to give them any bit of normalcy in all the oddities of their lives.
She planned their gifts months in advance. When they regrouped back on Earth in November, she picked up a custom-made engraved leather jacket for Kora and a vintage typewriter for Daniel.
Daisy knows all the trouble was worth it when Kora can't contain her smile when she sees the slick personalized dark, edgy purple jacket. She shows her younger-older sister her embroidered name on the inside of the jacket. Daisy loves this having a sister thing more than she ever thought she would.
But it's the typewriter she's nervous about.
Because technically she hadn't told Daniel she loved him.
Of course, he said it first, show off.
From the day she told Daniel about Lincoln, he had been so open with her.
And he never expected anything back from her. She appreciated how much space he gave her as a partner. He knew she wasn't ready to verbalize those exact words to him.
That didn't mean she wasn't feeling it. Because she certainly was.
But it didn't get her until she scoured several hundred L.A. vintage stores for the perfect replica of a vintage 50s typewriter Daniel told her he had for years.
And it hit her like she ran into a damn wall.
She loved him. Bad. Like she'd write an album full of Taylor Swift ballads if they ever broke up, bad. Yuck, she thought.
+ i.
Giddy with anticipation, Daisy watched Daniel slowly unveil the meticulously wrapped paper covering the typewriter.
"Daisy..." He's stunned. He turns to her and asks incredulously, "Is this the same typewriter I told you about?"
She scrunches her nose slightly at his cuteness and shakes her head yes.
Before she knows it, he picks her up and swirls her around like he just won the lottery. He grabs both sides of her face, kisses her, and says ever so excitedly, "Do you know how much I love you?"
This is was it. She had to just open her mouth and say it.
"Yeah I do because I love you just about the same," she reveals.
He starts attacking her face with an endless bunch of kisses on her both her cheeks, forehead, nose, and eventually, he lands on her lips again.
She laughs at how he literally cannot contain his enthusiasm.
Daniel insists ardently, "Promise me we'll write to each other every chance we get."
"I promise."
-
To my Daisy,
I knew I loved you the second you pretended not to remember "accidentally" quaking me out of bed.
Yours,
Daniel