Snapshots

The first time Violet met Peggy Carter at the office where her Daniel worked, she thought little of it beyond a sort of admiration for the woman who had caught the eyes of Captain America himself. Peggy was pretty, sure, and confident, but she was also obviously a career woman, too restless and headstrong to be interested in something as mundane as settling down and starting a family. 

Her offer of a cookie was accepted with grace, and her offer of a tour around declined just the same, so she kissed Daniel goodbye and headed for work, cheerful at the prospect of finally being able to go on their date. It had been a while since they’d been able to do more than catch a quick lunch at a nearby shop, or watch a little bit of television before collapsing into bed, exhausted.  She was picking up extra shifts where she could, and Daniel had been short-staffed, so he’d been working long hours so his subordinates didn’t have to.  It was very noble of him, of course, but left little time in their schedules for anything like romance.

When Daniel called, apologetic, to cancel their date because a new murder case had to take precedence over their personal life, she thought nothing of it. With a laugh, and a promise that they’d make time for another try, they went their separate ways.  It was just as well, though, because one of the other nurses was in a minor accident on her way to work, so Violet agreed to stay on until the overnight shift started.

Exhausted, she made her way home, then undressed and collapsed into bed, too tired to even think about making food for herself. She did send up a quick prayer that Daniel would wrap up his murder case quickly, though. 

When morning came, Violet met Daniel at the local coffee shop, where they shared a quick kiss over a cup of coffee and a croissant before hurrying their separate ways. Violet wondered sometimes if it wouldn’t simply be easier if they lived together, but neither of them were prepared for that last step just yet, though she had her suspicions, having noticed the way Daniel had been watching her lately whenever he thought she wasn’t looking.  It was kind of adorable, really.

A week later, there was still no relief, for either of them. Violet picked up an extra shift – though this time she was certain that the girl who called in sick was probably not sick so much as enamored of her shiny new television.

When she made it home that night, she found evidence of a second person in her home. Cautiously, she moved through the house, catching sight of the cold remains of a romantic dinner on the table and her boyfriend fast asleep on the couch.  Feeling guilty, she shook Daniel awake to apologize, and to chase him to bed.

Daniel stretched, blinking up at her dazedly for a long moment before jerking upright, causing Violet to step back in surprise. “Who’s that?”  His eyes cleared, and he blinked at her, then blushed.  “Oh, hey.  You scared me,” he admitted sheepishly.

“Scared you?” Violet demanded with a breathless laugh. “You broke into my house!”

Daniel blushed, one hand reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. “Yeah, I know.  I’m sorry,” he apologized.  “I…I thought it would be nice to surprise. I must’ve nodded off.”

Violet made a sympathetic noise and offered her own apologize. “Hey, I’m so sorry.  I didn’t know you had a thing planned.  I had to cover an extra shift.  Let me get some coffee going,” she said, turning back towards the kitchen with a soft sigh.  “Regina called in sick.  Actually, do you remember Regina?”

“Uh…the one with the lisp?” Daniel tried.

Violet laughed. “No, no.  The one with the mole,” she corrected, though judging by his blank stare, that wasn’t much more helpful.  “Anyway…her youngest has a stomach bug…vomit everywhere, or so she says,” she continued, hands moving easily in an age-old ritual.  “Rumor is her husband surprised her with one of those televisions.  So she could’ve been…lying,” she trailed off, watching her boyfriend fumble around the couch cushions.

Catching her staring at him, Daniel chuckled nervously. “I, um…I lost something.”

“Oh, let me help you,” she offered, moving to kneel on the floor in front of the couch. What are you….what are you looking for?” she laughed, their hands tangling together on the sofa.

“You’ll know it when you see it,” Daniel muttered.

Violet chuckled lightly. “You’re not making any sense!” she informed him cheerfully, curiosity and anticipation curling warm inside her.

“I know” Daniel replied, and he sounded frustrated. “Umm…I mean….this is going terribly,” he admitted ruefully, with a loud sigh.  Reaching out, he stopped her, gripping her hands lightly in his larger ones and waiting until she met his eyes.  You’re wonderful,” he started.

“You’re pretty wonderful yourself,” Violet answered easily. It was true, after all; Daniel was brave and honest and hard-working; he’d make an excellent husband and father some day.

“Thank you,” Daniel accepted the compliment graciously. Violet tried not to laugh.  Daniel’s face grew serious, his thumbs tracing light circles on the back of her hands.  When I first moved here, I just wanted a fresh start.  And then I met you, and you were so…mean,” he admitted sheepishly. 

Violet laughed. “I was not mean!” she argued.  She had been his physical therapist, which meant being a little tough on him. It wasn’t the same thing at all!

Daniel leaned in and kissed her gently, just a quick brush of lips. “Yes, you were cruel and uncompromising and lovely,” he murmured.  “All those months of physical therapy with you, and I started to feel like myself again.  Because of you,” he reiterated.

“Daniel,” Violet started, having a growing suspicion of where this conversation was headed and not knowing whether to be nervous or ecstatic.

Daniel sighed, his head bowing for a moment before he looked up again with a wry, lopsided smile. “Had a whole speech prepared,” he admitted, “and none of my plans involved asking you to marry me with my hands in the couch because I lost the ring.  Um…I can’t find the ring,” he repeated, frowning.

Violet felt her grin widening, happiness winning over her nerves. Oh, that’s….why,” she said.  That’s why he’d gone to the trouble of making a romantic dinner for two.  That’s why he’d fallen asleep on her couch.  That’s the whole reason he’d come over tonight.

“That’s why,” Daniel agreed.

Violet pulled her hands free and reached out to tug away the first cushion. “Then, let’s find it,” she suggested.

Daniel had frozen on the couch. “S-so yes?” he asked tentatively.

“Yes?” she asked distractedly, still feeling around between the cushions. “Oh, yes,” she agreed when her brain caught up to what he was asking.

Daniel laughed. “Yes. Okay.  All right.”  Violet felt something cool, metal, and round in her hand and pulled it out.  “Oh! You found it.”

Opening her hand, Violet shook her head. “No, it’s a quarter,”” she said regretfully.  She eyed her fiancé – he was her fiancé now! – playfully.  “Keep looking, though.  We could make some money here!”

Daniel barked out a surprised laugh, a rough, happy noise that made Violet want to laugh, too. So she did.  Eventually, they even found the ring.

The next morning, Violet accompanied Daniel to his office, beaming widely. It was Peggy who first noticed the ring that adorned her finger, admiring it carefully when Violet held her hand out to show it off.  “He finally proposed, I see,” she remarked dryly, shooting the oblivious Daniel an amused look.  “I’m not sure whether to congratulate you, or to give you my condolences.”  But her smile was kind and sincere when she said it, and Violet couldn’t help but smile back, knowing that Peggy hadn’t meant anything unkind by her words.  The brunette was far too straightforward for that, but she had a dry sort of wit about her that Violet found delightful.

Daniel endured the hazing by his fellow officers while Peggy and Violet talked, and Violet learned that Peggy had almost been married once, before her brother had died in action and she’d joined the war effort as a field agent. Violet was sympathetic, but she didn’t pity Peggy in the least.  The woman was strong and independent, and Violet just knew that she’d find somebody one day who could appreciate her for who she was.

Daniel approached them a little bit later with an apologetic smile for Violet. “Sorry, sweetheart,” he murmured. “Duty calls.”  Violet just shook her head; she had a lunch date with a girlfriend in an hour, anyhow, and gave him a quick kiss, ignoring the cat calls from the cruder men in the office.  As she left, Daniel and Peggy were already bending over a folder together.

The next couple of days flew by in a happy haze of planning between work hours. She did her best to not call Daniel while he was out on a case – other people’s lives depended on him, after all – but she could barely contain her excitement.  Nothing struck her as being amiss.  In fact, Daniel was actually home more often now than he had been before, entertaining them both with stories from his coworkers.  Violet knew Rose and Peggy, of course, having met them before, but Dr. Samberly, Edwin Jarvis, and Jason Wilkes were all new to her.  Daniel couldn’t tell her everything, of course, and Violet had the feeling that he was leaving a lot out, especially where Peggy and Jarvis were concerned, but the stories he had to tell were entertaining nonetheless.

In return, Violet would tell him about some of the odd cases that came through the hospital – the old lady with frostbite in the middle of July; the man with a beard longer than he was tall; the family that swore they’d been run off the road by a ghost in broad daylight.

When Daniel told her that he had something to take care of in the dead of the night, Violet sent him off with a kiss and a packed dinner, and set about cleaning the house – it would be their house soon, after all, if Daniel agreed to move in with her after the wedding – humming cheerfully to herself.

The knock at two in the morning was decidedly unexpected. Even before she made it to the door, it was being shoved open by Daniel and another man, Peggy Carter braced between them, barely upright. Violet’s eyes were drawn to the darker color of blood as the two men brought Peggy inside, the second man pausing just long enough to nod at her absently, his attention focused on the brunette.  Shutting the door behind them, Violet hurried over.  “What happened?” she demanded, horrified.

“She fell,” Daniel grunted. Violet would have pressed further, but Peggy gave a weak moan, and she fell into nurse mode.

“Over there,” Edwin said, turning towards the couch. The two men picked up their pace, settling Peggy on the couch where only days before, Daniel had proposed to her.

“She needs to go to a hospital,” Violet said, not understanding why they hadn’t done that in the first place.  It was obvious that Peggy was badly hurt and needed medical attention.

“No! No hospital!” Peggy insisted vehemently.

“It’s okay, Peg. No hospitals.  I promise,” Daniel soothed, grunting as he helped the other man get her settled.

“A hospital would be extremely unsafe,” their companion agreed. “There are very powerful people after her.”  And they were…what? Trusting that Violet could protect them better than an entire staff of doctors and  nurses and security guards?

Peggy moaned, and the two men turned to her as one. “Peggy, stay calm,” Daniel urged, his hand gripping her shoulder tightly.

Violet straightened up and took charge, grabbing her medical bag. “Okay, this…this is what I need.  Daniel, grab some linens from the cupboard.  We need to pack the wound.  Um, Mister, um...”

“Edwin Jarvis, Miss, at your service,” the gentleman offered, scrupulously polite even as Violet could see the panic in his eyes and hear it in the strain of his voice.

“Mr. Jarvis, I need you to boil some water.”

“Very good,” he agreed. And he hurried away to do as he’d been told.

“Absolutely,” Daniel said finally, but he made no effort to move as Peggy made another pain noise. Violet turned back to her patient.

“Daniel.” He didn’t seem to even hear her.  “Daniel!” she snapped, drawing his focus back to her abruptly.  “I need linens.  Go to the cupboard, and grab the old sheets.”

Daniel blinked, as if coming out of a daze. “Right. Sorry,” he said, turning away – finally – to do as she’d asked. 

“Okay. Okay,” Violet muttered to herself as she checked Peggy’s pulse, trying to ignore the pained moans emanating from the prone figure.  She could see the pain lines drawing tight across the agent’s mouth and brow, and wished she could do more, but she would have to settle for stopping the bleeding for now.  “Heart rate is up,” she said, mostly to herself as she carefully peeled away the fabric that had been pressed against Peggy’s wound, checking on it.

“Bleeding appears to be under control,” she said, taking a deep breath. Now came the hard part.  She gave Peggy one more chance.  “This would really be better if you went to a hospital.”

“No!” Peggy replied instantly, then again, softer. “No.”

Violet nodded; she hadn’t expected anything else, not really. She was starting to see why Daniel liked her so much.  “Then, deep breaths, Peggy,” she said, untwisting the cap on a bottle, “’cause this is gonna hurt.”  With that, she upended the bottle of alcohol directly onto the wound. 

Peggy screamed. Then, mercifully, she passed out.

Both men came running at the sound of Peggy’s scream, Jarvis somehow managing to not spill the large bowl of boiling water he was holding, and Daniel struggling with his cane, his other arm full of linens. Peggy took the items from them and set about cleaning, packing, and wrapping Peggy’s wounds, directing the men to move her as needed.

When she was pretty sure that Peggy would make it through the night, she set about cleaning up, leaving the boys to tend to their unconscious companion. Daniel settled next to Peggy’s legs on the couch while Jarvis hovered nervously nearby, occasionally straightening something that hardly needed it.

Periodically, Violet would check Peggy’s heartbeat, relieved to find that it had evened out, growing stronger and steadier now that she was allowed to rest. Daniel moved away from her side only once, to make a phone call.

“Yeah, she’s gonna be okay,” he reassured the person on the other end of the line, nodding at whatever the other person was saying. “Thanks, Rose.”

Hanging up, he turned towards Peggy, who was awake and trying to prop herself up on the cushions. Violet didn’t move, not wanting to be noticed just yet, not when she wasn’t sure what expression was on her face.  “Rose and Dr. Samberly just finished securing the uranium rods,” he told her.

Peggy blinked, then grunted. “Well, that’s a plus….at least.  Mnh. Oh, God,” she muttered, wincing at what was surely agony emanating from the wound in her side.  Violet bit back the urge to fuss at her to lie still and not exacerbate the injury, but Peggy was a grown woman.  Besides, she was more interested in listening to the two of them talk.

Daniel sighed. “You really scared me there.  Please don’t do that again,” he asked quietly.

Peggy gave him a wry look. “Get impaled?” she teased roughly.

“Yes, chief,” Daniel replied simply. Peggy seemed at a loss for words, unwilling to make that promise but wanting to nonetheless.  Violet saved her from needing to say anything by walking into the room.

“Your bleeding’s already under control. The rebar missed everything vital,” she informed Peggy.  “You’ll need to rest, which means no more….well, doing whatever the hell you were doing.  You just need to be boring for a while,” she told her with a light-hearted smile that felt somehow wrong on her face.

“Ah, good. You’re awake.”  Jarvis’ voice startled Violet, and she turned to look at the tall Englishman.  “I pulled the car around.”

Violet frowned. “Ah.  She really shouldn’t be moving around all that much,” she protested.  She turned to the woman lying on her sofa.  “It might be better if you stay with me for a few days, Peggy,” she offered, already knowing what the other woman was going to say.

“Oh, I couldn’t possibly ask any more of you,” Peggy said, beckoning Jarvis closer.

“Here we go,” he said, helping Peggy to her feet.

Peggy smiled at Violet. “Thank you,, Violet.  Truly,” she said sincerely.

“Any time,” Violet replied, because what else was there to say?

Peggy laughed, then winced, her free hand clutching at her side. Together, Peggy and Jarvis hobbled towards the door, where Jarvis nodded at her.  “Thank you so much,” he said, his eyes genuinely grateful.  And then they were gone, and it was just her and Daniel.  Violet could feel the distance between them, acutely aware that she’d somehow managed to miss something so terribly iimportant.

“You were amazing tonight,” Daniel told her, reaching for her with is free hand.

Violet shrugged him off. “You didn’t tell me,” she accused.

Daniel blinked, confused. “Tell you what?” he asked.  “About the mission?  You….you know I can’t tell you about the….”

Violet interrupted him before he could get started. She didn’t want to hear his excuses for being oblivious to what was happening.  “No, I’m not talking about the mission.  You said you moved here because you wanted a fresh start,” she accused, hating how petty it made it her sound.  “But that’s not the whole truth, is it?”

Daniel looked genuinely confused as he stared at her. “Of course it is.”

Violet shook her head. She didn’t know how she didn’t see it before.  Peggy was strong, adventurous, kind, and intelligent.  She saw Daniel’s injury and ignored it, dragging him into the craziest situations without so much as a by-you-leave.  And what was worse, Daniel loved it!  He craved the adventure, the danger that made him feel more like a soldier and less like a wounded victim.  Violet closed her eyes; how could she have been so stupid?

“You were running away,” she said, though there was no accusation anymore. Perhaps Daniel hadn’t even realized what he was doing.

“No,” he denied. “No, I wasn’t.”  But he sounded unsure now, and Violet offered him a pained smile as she spoke the truth that he couldn’t.

“God,” she murmured, “you were running away from Peggy.”

Daniel looked almost panicked now as he held out his hands to her, reaching for her. She stayed just out of reach.  “Okay, Violet…” he started, “It’s not what you think it is.”

Violet tipped her head to the side, blinking back tears – there would be time for those later. “Well, I think you’re in love with her,” she stated simply, watching him absorb the words, first with shock, then with consideration, and finally with a resigned sort of acceptance.  “Aren’t you, Daniel?”