"Wait, you're dating him?" a young nurse squealed, shoving her phone into Mara's face. Mara blinked at the sudden intrusion to her charting and focused her vision on the headline, "WINTER SOLDIER HAS SUMMER FUN" above a picture of Bucky at the barbeque laughing with someone, probably at Sam's expense.
"Let me see that," Mara said, grabbing the phone and scrolling. It was from some local Louisiana paper that must have gone viral. The pictures were all candids from earlier in the night before the press had been sent away. Bucky laughing with Sarah, Bucky playing with the kids, Bucky talking to the press with his arm around Sam. And there, third from the bottom, was a picture of Mara and Bucky laughing and dancing with the rest of Delacroix with the caption, "James Barnes dancing with a Doctor Mara Anderson. Unnamed sources confirm the two have been living together since April."
"Oh my gosh, is he the one who has you smiling so much?" a first year who should have been doing something else asked, craning his head over Mara's shoulder to look at the picture of them together.
"He's cute!" another resident chimed in.
"Don't you all have patients?" Mara demanded, not sure if she should be laughing or scolding them.
"This is more exciting," the nurse said with a shrug, taking back her phone and zooming in on Bucky's face. "Oh, he is cute!"
Mara groaned and tried to wave them away, but the group surrounding her only attracted more attention and soon it felt like everyone on the floor was obsessing over her and Bucky. She tried to tune them out and focus on her paperwork for the rest of the five minutes she had to catch up, but the questions soon became incessant and with a groan she turned in her chair to face her audience.
"Okay, let's get this over with: yes, I am in a relationship. Yes, it is with Bucky Barnes. No, you cannot meet him. And no, you cannot ask any more questions. Capish?"
The spectators shot each other looks before nodding and slowly dissipating. Mara glanced at the clock and scowled. Now she was five hours behind on paperwork, instead of just four hours and forty-five minutes.
"Dr. Anderson?" a quiet voice asked.
"What is it, Jenni?" Mara said, looking up to see one of the veteran nurses smiling at her.
"I wanted to say that it's good to see you so happy," the older woman said kindly, resting her hand on Mara's shoulder and lightly squeezing.
"Thank you," Mara replied, smiling back at her. "It's good to be happy."
"And you tell that boy of yours if he breaks your heart my wife works in the morgue and one more body wouldn't draw any suspicions," the sweet woman added with a scowl that cooled off even the most unruly of patients.
"I'll be sure to pass that along," Mara agreed with a laugh. Jenni nodded in satisfaction and continued on with wherever she was going. Mara watched her round the corner and let her smile drop with a sigh. She dug her phone out from beneath the pile of paperwork she had buried it under and checked her notifications. Calls and texts and emails from everyone from her neighbors to her freshman year roommate, all asking if the news was true.
Her phone vibrated as a call came through and Bucky's name showed on the caller ID.
"Hey, you," Mara answered, pinching her brow.
"Hey, you," he replied a little worriedly. "So you saw the news?"
"Yep," she confirmed, standing and walking away from the station so they could get a moment of privacy. "We agreed it was okay if we went public," she reminded them both.
"Yeah, but we didn't really think people would care," Bucky replied. "I figured if we told people at Sam's birthday party the news would get buried under all the Captain America fanfare."
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The Hurt And The Healing: Bucky X OC
FanfictionIn his attempts to make amends Bucky Barnes meets the headstrong and fiercely independent Mara and her endearingly stubborn Nona, who are both unknowing victims of the Winter Soldier. As Bucky tries to help them despite Mara's mistrust of his motive...
