Chapter 16
Adelaide giggled as she tapped away on her phone, in her own little world. Clint and Wanda watched her with smiles on their faces, but neither asked what she was doing. Suddenly, her eyes widened, and she tore off down the hallway, yelling for Natasha. Clint and Wanda looked at each other in confusion. What was their little girl up to now?
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“Auntie Nat! Auntie Nat!” Addie called, running towards the training room. She burst in, looking around for the Russian. She didn’t find her, but she did find Sam and Scott, who were sparring on the mat.
“What’s up, Ladie?” Scott asked, panting slightly.
“Where’s Auntie Nat?” Adelaide asked.
“Don’t know,” Sam grunted as Scott landed a punch on his chest. “Try her room.”
“Or the communications room,” Scott suggested. Adelaide nodded and took off again. She finally found the redhead on the roof, enjoying the sun.
“Auntie Nat!” Adelaide exclaimed. The woman turned around and looked at her in surprise.
“What’s wrong, Addie?” she asked. The ex-assassin looked at the teenager in concern. She’d sprouted in the last few months, and the seventeen-year-old was almost as tall as her father, only about two inches shorter at 5’8”. The girl was currently panting and had wide eyes, her phone that had been souped up by Tony for a birthday present clutched tightly in her hand.
“I need your help, and you can’t tell anybody!”
“Anybody?” Natasha asked.
“Anybody, not even Uncle Clint. Or Wanda. Nobody!” This had to be serious. Even though she talked to her dad all the time and told him most of what was going on in her life, Clint, Wanda, and herself were Adelaide’s confidants. They knew everything about the girl. “Auntie Nat, you have to promise!”
“Okay, I promise. What’s up?”
“No, not here. FRIDAY is a tattle-tale. She’ll tell Uncle Tony.” Natasha conceded on that point. The AI was always listening and told its maker everything going on in the Tower.
“Alright. Then where?”
“I’ll text you.” With that, Adelaide spun around and ran back inside. She took off to her room and jumped onto her bed, tapping out a message to her aunt before putting shoes on and bolting back out into the hallway. She met her dad in the common area, who smiled and hugged her.
“Where’re you off to in a hurry?” he asked, giving her a curious look.
“Places,” she said vaguely, but there was a teasing lilt in her voice.
“Oh? And who’s going with you to these places?” he pushed, ever the over-protective father.
“Auntie Nat. I’m meeting her there because she had to get ready. Don’t worry, Daddy.” She kissed his cheek and ducked out of his arms, waving as she entered the elevator. Once in the lobby, she walked out, tapping away on her phone again and leaving, catching a taxi outside the building. She got out at the desired meeting place and went inside to get a place to sit down and wait for Natasha to get there.
She found a table in the corner of the balcony that was out of the way and somewhat secluded and sat down. The smell of old books always calmed her down. Her father and Uncle Steve had brought her here when they first got back to NYC, telling her that this bookstore had been around since the 40s, and they’d come here all the time, then and now. She’d fallen in love with the place and knew all of the workers by name. The elderly owner named Richard was her favorite. He was old enough to remember stories of Captain America and the Howling Commandos, but he never got star-struck. He accepted the two men as old friends and fellow soldiers and started treating Adelaide like his own granddaughter. He always had something to give her, and he’d pat her hand as he pressed a twenty into it or a book he thought she’d like and say,
“You take care of your daddy, little lady. He needs a sweet little thing like you after all he’s been through.” She’d smile and promise that she would and go on about her day. Richard wasn’t working today, but she nodded to his daughter Gladys all the same. Finally, Natasha walked up to her and sat down, looking at her with worry.
“Okay, what’s so secretive that you can’t talk about it at the Tower?” Adelaide knew no one was here, and that she could trust Natasha, but she still looked around to make sure no one was within hearing distance. This was a time-sensitive and dangerous topic.
“You promise you won’t tell anyone?” she asked.
“I promise, Addie,” Natasha said seriously. Adelaide nodded.
“Okay. I’ve made a few friends since coming to this bookstore and the little dime-store down the street.” Natasha nodded at the pause. She was following the conversation. “I got their numbers, and I’ve been talking to them and hanging out with them every-so-often when I could. I promise, we aren’t doing anything bad or something like that. We went bowling last Saturday, and then shopping at the mall Wednesday.” Natasha’s eyes widened. She hadn’t even known about this.
“Why didn’t you tell us you were making friends?” she asked, trying to understand.
“It’s not that I didn’t tell you. All of you have just been so busy lately, helping Uncle Scott get settled into the Tower and everything, that I haven’t had a chance.” Natasha gently squeezed the girl’s hand.
“Addie, you know we’ll always make time for you. You’re our little girl. We want to hear about your friends and the things you do with them. It’s what a family does.” Adelaide nodded.
“I know, and I was going to tell you, but this thing came up, and I’m not sure what to do.”
“Okay, I’m listening.”
“So, there’s five of us in my group of friends: Lilly, Vincent, Killian, and Rachel. We’ve been hanging out and talking a lot, and it’s been really fun. Well, Vincent and I have been talking a lot more than the other three, but most of them are on spring break right now from school. I’m not in school anymore, and Vincent is homeschooled, so we’ve been talking about hanging out or him coming to meet all of you because I hated not telling everyone about my friends.” Natasha nodded and encouraged her to keep going with a nod. “Well, he sent me this message earlier.” She slid her phone across the table to Natasha and waited anxiously as she read it. She panicked when she saw the look on her aunt’s face. “Auntie Nat, don’t do it!” she yelped.
“Don’t do what?” Natasha asked innocently.
“Don’t go do a background check on him or whatever it was you were thinking about doing! He’s told me about his life, and I’ve met his mom, and the story checks out, I promise. You raised me right. I did my homework before hanging out with these guys. They’re all fine, good people. So, please don’t?” Natasha sighed and looked at the teenager in front of her. She’d grown up so much. She wasn’t a little girl anymore, and she was going about things in a safe way like all of them had taught her. She knew that she always had a knife on her person and could easily throw a man three times her size across the room. As much as she wanted to, Natasha knew that she shouldn’t coddle her and be a crazy aunt, but support her little niece’s decisions.
“Okay, I won’t. I trust you, Addie. So, what do you need my help with?”
“You read the text. Vincent wants me to go to the movies with him next Friday night.”
“And?”
“It’s a date, Auntie Nat! I don’t know anything about those! What do I do?”
“Well, first of all, you should calm down.” Adelaide was clearly freaking out. “Deep breaths, Addie.” Once the girl calmed down, Natasha took both of her hands in her own. “Now, the next thing you need to do is tell the others. They deserve to know, and your friend is going to have to get the third-degree sometime. I trust you, Addie, but your father needs to know about this. You never could hide anything really well, and this is no exception.” Adelaide sighed and nodded.
“I know. But he’s going to freak out, I just know it! And Vincent’s a great guy, Auntie Nat. I really like him, but I’m afraid Daddy’s going to scare him off.” Natasha sighed. It was a valid point.
“Tell you what. I’ll back you up when you tell the boys, and I’ll keep Bucky in heel when your friend comes over, okay?”
“Would you?” Adelaide asked in relief. “That’d be great!”
“Sure. But we need to let Wanda in on this first.”
“Why?”
“We need to get you an outfit, girl! You’re going on your first date!”
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“Okay, Addie, everybody’s here,” Natasha said, sitting down next to Clint and Scott. Adelaide stood nervously in front of her family, all of their eyes watching her. She’d been in many terrifying positions in her life, but she was ready to bolt at any second. She glanced over at Wanda, who gave her a small smile.
Don’t be scared, Addie, she said gently inside her head. Everything’ll be fine. Adelaide took a deep breath and calmed her racing heart as best she could.
“I have to tell all of you something,” she said, “and you have to promise me before you start that you won’t overreact or do anything until I’m done.” Everyone nodded their consent, and she took another deep breath. “I don’t want you to think that I’ve been hiding this from you, but you’ve all been so busy helping Uncle Scott move in that I haven’t had the chance to tell you.” She paused, gathering her nerves. She felt like her heart was about to beat out of her chest!
“What is it, Addie?” Steve asked, giving her an encouraging nod to continue.
“I’ve made some friends,” she began. “They all work at the library or the dime-store three blocks down. I know all of their parents and siblings because all of them work there, and we’ve been meeting for the past few weeks to go places. I promise that I’ve always had my knife with me, and it was always really public places where nothing could ever happen that I couldn’t already handle.”
“That’s great, Ladie,” Scott said. “It’s good that you’ve made some friends your age.” Adelaide smiled a bit, but she didn’t relax.
“There’s more, isn’t there?” Sam asked. Addie nodded slightly.
“There’s a boy,” she said simply, and she watched most of the men’s faces blank. She actually felt like her heart stopped for a moment, and she looked to Wanda and Natasha in a panic.
Tell them the rest, Wanda urged her. Adelaide waved her hands a bit, and all of the eyes snapped back to her. She didn’t dare to even look at her father, choosing instead to look at Pietro and Bruce, who seemed the calmest about the news.
“His name is Vincent, and he’s a very nice boy, and he’s asked me to go to the movies with him this Friday to see the reshowing of The Princess Bride. I told him yes.”
“You what?” Bucky asked, and Adelaide flinched a tiny bit. She slowly turned her face to meet her dad’s eyes, and he looked like he was caught between being angry and shocked, and he kept going back and forth between the two emotions.
“Here,” Adelaide said, pulling a manila envelope off of the table nearby and handing it to him. Steve, Tony, and Clint all crowded around Bucky as he opened in. “That’s everything I could find on him: birth certificate, current address, Social Security number, past jobs, everything. If you want DNA and blood type, it’s in the part labeled ‘Health.’ He’s good, Daddy. I checked him out, and Auntie Natasha checked it all out for me.” Bucky looked positively thunderstruck. The four men read over the files, passing them around their little group. Scott and Bruce stood up, patting her shoulder or head before they left to go back to their lives.
“I’m happy for you, Ladie,” Scott said. “He seems like a good guy. Seen him in the dime-store a few times.” She smiled and nodded.
“Thanks, Uncle Scott.”
“Sure thing, sugarplum. I’m going to go to bed. See ya in the morning.” Scott left. Pietro ruffled her hair and bolted off, saying something about going for a run. Natasha and Wanda stayed behind to be the buffer for the inevitable explosion that was going to come, and Vision merely stayed because he had nothing better to do. Sam wandered off to go do something, but he gave her a smile as he left, winking as well as he turned the corner. So, she had half of her family on her side. This was better than she thought it would be. She sat down Bruce’s recently-vacated armchair and waiting anxiously for everyone else to catch up.
“Which theater is he taking you to?” Tony asked.
“The small one about eight blocks east of Brooklyn. It’s called Premium Matinee,” she answered. Steve’s eyes widened in recognition.
“I know that place,” he said. “That theater was running when we were still kids, Buck!” Her father grunted, reading through another paper.
“Yeah, Vincent heard about it from me talking to him.”
“Do your friends know who your family is?” Clint asked.
“I’ve told them a bit of general information, but not too much. They know it’s big, and I’m the fifth youngest.”
“Who are the others?” Tony asked.
“Cooper, Lily, Nathaniel, and Cassie,” Adelaide replied. “I haven’t told them that I live in Avengers’ Tower and my uncle is Iron Man and my dad is the ex-Winter Soldier.”
“Still am, technically,” Bucky grumbled, glancing up at her. Oh, no. This was bad. She’d seen that look before. Oh, this was going to go downhill really fast. Ooh, this was going to be ugly.
“But my friends don’t know that!” she exclaimed. “I haven’t told them anything. I told them I have a big family with a lot of uncles and a few cousins and some older siblings, but that’s it, I promise! They don’t know anything about any of you!”
“When were you planning on telling us about this?” he asked, his eyes narrowing. Oh, this was going to be so, so bad.
“I was going to tell you a month ago when I first started hanging out with them, but then there was a mission that all of you had to go on. When you got back, all of you were tired, and I let you sleep. Then, Uncle Scott said he was going to move in, and everyone scrambled to make sure that he knew where everything was and where his room was and that it was clean and helped him pack and move, and you were too busy. Then, once that was finished, you were too tired again! I told FRIDAY to tell all of you, but everyone was so busy that apparently no one paid attention to our friendly neighborhood AI. I tried to tell you so many times, but if I had waited to get your approval beforehand, I wouldn’t have any friends right now!”
“Bring them over, Addie,” Tony said suddenly, and Bucky’s head turned to face him so fast that Adelaide was momentarily concerned that he’d give himself whiplash. “It’s only what, Monday? Have them over Wednesday. We’ll meet them; they’ll meet us, and if we approve, you can go on the date, okay?” Adelaide sighed and nodded. That was the best she was going to get at the moment. Her dad was getting ready to blow a gasket, it looked like. She made a mental note to be ready to get FRIDAY ready with the sprinkler system, because she was pretty sure that James Barnes was going to burst into flames at any given second.
“Are you sure, Uncle Tony?” she asked, pointedly looking away from her father.
“Sure thing, Bit. We should probably meet them sometime, right? After all, our little Adelaide has friends; they ought to meet that family.” Adelaide smiled and hugged him.
“Thanks,” she said. “I’ll go text them now.” She hurried off down the hall and jumped onto her bed, leaving her door open a crack. She and her dad shared an apartment with Steve in Avengers’ Tower, and they had a system in place. Open doors meant come on in; closed was knock before entering or just plain stay away. She unlocked her phone (a souped up one courtesy of Uncle Tony) and opened up the group message with her friends.
Hey, you guys free Wednesday?-A Her phone began going off not a minute later, a saxophone rift going off every time a text came in.
Yep -R
Sure -K
What’s up? –L
I am now. –V
My family wants to meet my new friends. They want you to be here on Wednesday. –A
…
…
…
…
Okay. I’ll be at our usual spot at 9:30 –K
Me too –R
See you guys there –L
I’ll be there with bells on –V
Okay. Great! I’ll let them know. Warning: they are a bit overwhelming, and overbearing at times. Please don’t let them scare you off! –A
Don’t worry, ‘die. We don’t scare easily –R
Yeah, A, how bad can they be?? –L
Very bad. Please, just be yourselves –A
I’ll show up in my AC/DC shirt and ripped jeans, and if they have a problem, then we’ll have a problem –K
Killian, you better behave yourself –A
I’m wounded, love! Wounded!! –K
We’ll be good, Addie. I’ll keep Ian in line –V
Thanks, Vince. You’re the best. See you guys later! –A
Barkley! I told you not to call me that! –K
Let it go, Ramone. Or fight about it in the park later. Not in the group message. Some of us are busy –L
Bye, guys! –A/R
Adelaide smiled and shook her head at her friends before putting her phone on silent and playing a game. The door was pushed open, and she looked up to see Steve and Bucky standing in the doorway. “I’m meeting them at our usual meeting place at 9:30 to bring them here,” she said, looking up at the two men. “They promised to behave, mostly. Killian’s a troublemaker anyway.” Steve huffed a laugh and shook his head, leaving the doorway as he called back to them over his shoulder.
“I’m ordering pizza! Don’t go too far away!” Bucky stood silently in the doorway, and Adelaide looked at him nervously.
“Please, don’t be mad, Daddy,” she said quietly. “I really was going to tell you, but there was never a good time.”
“I know, kotenok, I believe you,” he said, coming in and closing the door behind him. He sat on her bed next to her and hugged her to him. “I just didn’t realize how big you’ve gotten. You’re not my little kotenok anymore. You’re all grown-up and going places without me, and I just wasn’t ready for that.”
“Was the date too much?” she asked nervously.
“I really wasn’t ready for that one,” he consented. “And if that boy hurts you, I’m going to kill him.”
“Papa,” she said in exasperation.
“I’ll always be overprotective of you, moya angel,” he said to her with a smile. “It’s my job as a daddy.” She sighed and nodded.
“I know. Just please, try not to scare them too much? For me?”
“No promises, myshka. They have to know where they stand with me.”
“At least back off of Rachel and Lilly. Please? They’re my best girl friends.”
“That I can promise.” She smiled at him with a twinkle in her eyes.
“If you wanted to mess with Killian though, I wouldn’t object too much,” she said. Bucky grinned a truly terrifying grin and squeezed her tightly. Oh, this was going to be fun!