The Collection- Bucky Barnes

Just Friends vi: December

Now, she knows good and well that three suitcases is too many for just four days. She easily could have worked with two. Easily. But three seems perfectly fine to her as well. One for her clothes. One for shoes. One for toiletries. Plus there's still plenty of room in the back of her Range Rover for Bucky's things.

The car may or may not have been an early Christmas gift to herself. Not only was she in serious need of an upgrade, her old car wasn't exactly baby-approved. The new model Range Rover is top of the line in safety and that's all she really cares about. Plus, it looks super cool.

"Hey," three knocks against her doorframe and Bucky is striding into her room, "ready? We should get a move on if we want to beat the snow." From the look of the melting flakes in his hair and the shoulders of his coat, they're already too late.

"Oh, yeah. Just got my last bag zipped." She takes in his flushed appearance, noting he's already loading his stuff up. As usual, he's just waiting on her. "Snow sticking?"

He grumbles an affirmative answer. If there's one thing worse than NYC traffic, it's NYC traffic in the snow. "Stay here. I'll go toss these in the car and come back to help you down the steps."

"Buck, I'm thirty weeks pregnant. I can make it down some stairs."

The further along she gets, the more concerned he becomes. She's got ten weeks left and she's so stressed out by him she isn't sure she can handle it. She knows it all comes from that ooey gooey center of his heart and she's a thousand times grateful for it but when he starts doubting her ability to get up and down the stairs...

"Sure. Not now, though. I've been tracking in snow, they're slick. Rather you not break your neck."

Okay, now she feels like an ass. Jules waves him on, promising to stay put as he takes her bags down to the car. As she waits, she sends a quick text to her mom to let her know they're about to head out. It's ten in the morning so they should be getting to Island Pond about four. Hopefully that has them missing the big snow supposedly coming in.

"All right." Bucky comes bounding into her room, dusting snow from his shoulders. He's overly cautious heading down the stairs. Attached to her side, one arm behind her and the other holding her hand. He was right, she hates to admit. The steps are wet with melted snow.

At best, she would have busted her ass. At worst...No, she's not going to think of that. Never think of bad things or they'll happen.

He's just as careful helping her into the passenger seat of her car; the walkway and driveway slicked with ice. Her whole path a danger zone for her pregnant self.

It's as she's buckling her seatbelt and he's climbing in the car that she regrets agreeing to drive to Vermont for Christmas. It had seemed a good idea last month, when she was considerably less pregnant. Then again, the six hour drive had sounded miserable to her then too. Which was why she pushed it off and agreed that her parents would spend Thanksgiving in Manhattan and she and Bucky would spend Christmas in Island Pond. Plus, they didn't want to celebrate a Christmas in their house until after the baby was born.

Six hours is a long ass time to be stuck in the car while seven months pregnant. She just hopes traffic is forgiving.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As luck would have it, traffic is not forgiving. They've been in the car about two hours and haven't even made it out of the city. So, they've technically still got almost a whole six hour drive ahead of them.

"This sucks." Jules moans. "I hate Christmas."

Bucky chuckles, shaking his head as he turns the radio down. "No, you don't. You love Christmas. You hate Christmas traffic."