Love Grows: Love Series 1 (demon!Bucky and pre-serum!Steve omegaverse au)

5

ON FRIDAY a few weeks later, Steve and Hodge went with two other couples to a preview of a play. It was a science fiction experiment about aliens invading New York. Steve found it interesting – to an extent – while Hodge thought it was boring and derivative. Really though, Steve thought Hodge was sore at losing out on a part to a lesser actor. Steve got it. Hodge was the better actor, he just was. And it ground Steve's gears that his husband was being passed over for roles that he could be brilliant at. So, he got it, he did, and he was upset on his spouse's behalf. But he also held onto the belief that soon Hodge would start living the dream in full. Then no one would turn him down for a role.

Afterwards, Steve and Hodge walked home. The night was chilly for September, so Steve huddled closer to Hodge. Glad that Hodge tightened his muscular arm around Steve's slender shoulders, reeling the smaller man in. All Steve could do was look up and smile when his husband's gaze fell down to him.

Turning the corner, the pair spotted a group of people gathered in a semicircle at the side of a parked car outside of Stark Tower. Two police cars waited double-parked, their roof lights flashing red and blue.

Picking up their pace, Steve and Hodge walked hand in hand to the front of the building. Cars slowed, trying to see the action. Other passersby gawked at the display, standing on tiptoes to see better. Windows opened and others inside of the Tower peeked their heads out.

The night lobby attendant, Jarvis, came outside with a tan blanket that a police officer took from him. As Steve and Hodge pushed their way through the crowd, Steve noticed that the roof of a car was crumpled on one side with the windshield shattered from the impact.

"Dead," someone said.

"I looked up and thought it was some kind of big bird zooming down," another person said.

Steve caught a glimpse of the person's face and gasped in horror. Turning into Hodge, he buried his face in the man's broad chest. Squeezing his eyes closed, he kept repeating, "It's Sharon. It's Sharon."

Holding Steve, Hodge commented, "Jesus."

"Get back, will ya?" One of the police officers ordered.

"We live here," Hodge answered, scent marking Steve as he held him tightly.

"'You know her?"

"My husband does," Hodge told the police officer.

"Yeah? What's her name?"

"Sharon," Steve sniffled, peeking over at the officer. "She was staying with her aunt and Uncle in 12A."

The officer nodded, "We've got that already."

Out of the corner of his eye, Steve spotted the blanket shrouded body and instinctively buried his face in Hodge's chest. He didn't know her very well, but they had done laundry once a week since meeting. Sure, it wasn't much, but Steve thought they could be friends. He liked Sharon. He liked her spunk and thought she was funny.

Guess you never really know what's going on with someone.

"We found this," an officer approached the one that had been talking to Hodge. Holding a sheet of pale yellow notebook paper. "Short and sweet; she stuck it to the window sill with a Band-Aid."

"Was anyone else home?"

The other shook his head.

The first officer took the note and read it, "Sharon Carter."

"I would've never thought," Steve sniffled. "She just seemed so happy."

"That's how it goes sometimes," the officer sadly commented.

"Do you know where her aunt and uncle are?"

"I don't," Steve said, wiping his eyes. Hodge added, "We haven't even met them yet. We moved in only a month ago."

The officer nodded but Jarvis looked past the group and said, "Here they come now."

Turning, Steve got his first look at the Sousas. Mrs. Sousa in a blood red dress that looked like she stepped right out of the 1940s with her white hair in soft pin curls. Beside her, Mr. Sousa in a dapper suit and a thick tie with pink stripes that reminded Steve of a candy cane and his thin white hair slicked back.

With the assistance of a cane, Mr. Sousa led the way through the crowd. The officer stepped forward to meet them and their smiles faltered. "Are you the Sousas on the twelfth floor?"

"We are," Mr. Sousa answered.

"You have a young woman named Sharon Carter living with you?"

"We do." Mr. Sousa confirmed while Mrs. Sousa clarified in a posh British accent, "Our niece."

"You'd better brace yourselves for some bad news," the officer started. "She's dead. She killed herself."

It felt like a blow to his chest and Steve sniffled again, feeling the tears building in the rim of his eyes. He couldn't imagine just how hard that would be for Sharon's aunt and uncle to hear.

Mrs. Sousa glanced at the now red-stained blanket, "It's a mistake. Somebody else is under there."

The officer turned to one of his colleagues, "Would you let these people take a look, please?"

Mrs. Sousa approached the lifeless body, her jaw set.

Mr. Sousa, on the other hand, stayed where he was. "I knew this would happen," he claimed. "She got deeply depressed every couple of weeks or so. I noticed it and told my wife, but she pooh-poohed me. Peggy's an optimist... or stubborn."

"Just because someone gets sad doesn't mean they're going to kill themselves," she argued, returning to her husband's side. "She was a happy girl. It must've been an accident. She must have been cleaning the windows and lost –"

"She wasn't cleaning windows at eleven-thirty at night."

"Why not?" Mrs. Sousa was defiant, "Maybe she was!"

Hodge took a step further away from the arguing couple. Steve was glad. He didn't feel like they should be hearing their neighbors at such a vulnerable moment without even being formally introduced.

Giving Hodge's trim waist a squeeze, Steve tried not to think about this. Tried not to listen as Mr. and Mrs. Sousa confirmed that it was, in fact, Sharon's handwriting. Tried not to hear Mrs. Sousa's soft cries and her husband softly comforting her.

"Let's go inside," Hodge decided. Nodding, Steve agreed. Removing himself from Hodge's front and settling for his side, allowing the beta to lead them inside. His gaze locking on Mrs. Sousa's as they left the elderly couple crying on the sidewalk.

Tomorrow, Steve told himself. Tomorrow I'll pay my condolences.

Until then, Steve had Hodge, and he was glad that Mrs. Sousa had her husband. At the very least, she had him.