The idea started, predictably, with Sam.
"I refuse," he announced, standing in the center of the common room like he was about to deliver a State of the Union, "to let our emotional recovery arc happen entirely inside this compound."
Nat didn't look up from her tablet. "The fact that you call it an arc is why you're not in charge."
"I am serious," Sam insisted, pointing at each of them like he was assigning blame. "We dismantled a corrupt director. We survived internal sabotage. We did not die. That deserves alcohol."
"It deserves rest," Steve corrected automatically.
"It deserves dancing," Wanda countered immediately, abandoning her book without even marking the page.
Melany looked up from where she was tucked against Bucky's side on the couch, his arm resting loosely around her shoulders. "It deserves wearing something that isn't tactical."
Bucky glanced down at her. "You own something that isn't tactical?"
She turned slowly. "You want to rethink that question?"
Sam grinned. "Oh, he does not."
Nat finally set the tablet down and studied the room.
The edge was gone.
The subtle hum of tension that had lived under their skin for weeks — the waiting, the scanning, the bracing — it had quieted.
No alerts.
No shadow investigations.
No hidden threat waiting to surface.
Just... stillness.
Stable stillness.
She exhaled once. "Fine," she said. "One night. We do not start anything."
Sam gasped dramatically. "You wound me."
"I can," she replied flatly.
-
Two hours later, they stood outside a downtown bar that vibrated with bass heavy enough to be felt through the sidewalk.
Neon lights flickered across brick. The line wrapped halfway around the building.
Steve assessed it like terrain.
"Why are there this many civilians in one place voluntarily?" he asked.
"Because," Sam replied patiently, "this is what joy looks like."
Wanda grabbed Melany's hand. "If we stand here any longer, I will narrate this like a tragic prelude."
Nat maneuvered them past the line with nothing but posture and eye contact.
They were inside within minutes.
The air hit them first — warm, thick with perfume and sweat and spilled liquor. Music pounded against their ribs. Colored lights swept across faces.
Melany paused just inside the entrance.
For a second, she let herself feel it.
No one staring.
No one recognizing.
No one expecting.
Just noise and anonymity.
She breathed out slowly.
"I love this," she murmured.
Bucky, right behind her, heard it.
YOU ARE READING
Doll. // Bucky Barnes X OC
FanfictionMelany Banner has spent her entire life being watched, protected, and managed - all because of who her father is. When a classified S.H.I.E.L.D. protocol forces her into close quarters with James Buchanan Barnes, she expects another soldier followin...
