✔𝚮𝐞𝐥𝐥𝛐 𝐒𝐮𝐧𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐞 ➳ 𝚩𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐲 𝚩𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐬

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 20: 𝐈𝐧 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐜𝐚𝐧'𝐭 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐞𝐲𝐞𝐬 𝛐𝐟𝐟 𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 𝛐𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐦𝛐𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 sneaked up on Jo. The sun slowly pierced the billowing curtains and kissed her face, telling her that it was indeed closer to noon, and it was about time to get up. The door across the hallway was wide open, Bucky gone. He had gone to bed much earlier last night than the rest of them.

Jo slipped into her bikini, along with a set of shorts and a small shirt. Anything more and she would be sweating within minutes. Downstairs, Pietro, and Tony were groggily eating the breakfast Peggy had prepared hours earlier.

Peggy and Steve had begun painting the outside of the house, but that meant cleaning it up first, removing all the curving vines that crawled up the walls. The three young adults tried to get out of the house as quickly as possible, not wanting to land in the crossfire of clean-up. They might enjoy being productive, but summer wasn't meant to be spent like that for Pietro, Tony, and Jo.

The three sneakily ran past the couple, going straight for the river, where they were planning to spend most of the day lounging about. The day was windier, pulling at their hair and causing the cackling river to sound more aggressive. Jo didn't mind it as long as no bears showed up.

"Is that what Randy's acid did to you?" Pietro asked when she undressed and started pulling off her plasters and bandages. She didn't want them to fall off in the water.

"And here I was thinking you were just going for a new look," Tony said while calmly raising an eyebrow.

"Oh yeah," she sheepishly laughed, having forgotten to tell her friends about that. So much had happened with Bucky, she didn't even think to tell them about her cuts. She couldn't exactly speak of Bucky, and he was the only thing on her mind these days.

"I went exploring upstream and ran into a bear," Jo replied with a shrug and stepped out of her shoes, being the first one to crawl up into the tree they liked jumping from.

"You were attacked by a bear?" Pietro puffed, scrambling to follow her, while Tony calmly watched them.

"No, no, just fell into the water further up before the waterfall. Shallow water with a strong current," she grinned back at Pietro. His eyebrows were still high on his forehead.

"Why didn't you say anything? That cut looks nasty." He pointed at the calf of hers not far from his eye-line.

"A lot of stuff happened. Didn't think about it." Her movements slowed as the branches thinned, and she crawled out onto one of them, out over the water.

"Wait, Jo, beating up your body jumping from all sorts of things sounds-"

Pietro's words disappeared as she set off from the branch. It was only about 10 feet from the water, nothing like the jump at the party. The water sprouted around her, swallowing her up, and her feet gently pressed against the bottom. She pushed off on the river bottom, peeking out of the water with a heavy breath. Her head breached the surface right as Pietro dropped next to her.

"You're such a fucking idiot," Pietro laughed and shot water at her, making her chuckle as the two swam back to the edge.

"You were the one calling me smart the first day here," she huffed and pulled herself up through the tall grass onto the shore.

"Nah, I said you were clever. Different things," Pietro smiled and grabbed the towel next to where Tony was sitting and smoking.

"Right on." Tony pointed at her with the smoke. "You're a fucking dumbass but a clever one."

"Well, if I wasn't clever, I wouldn't be able to get such great ideas."

"Think I'll have to rethink what I said. Your ideas are shit," Tony said, and she threw her shoe at him, causing him to let out a grin.