The Coffee Shop Girl ~ Bucky Barnes

Chapter 1

Bucky was surprised by how purposeful he felt when he awoke the next morning. Normally he had to drag himself out of bed - generally cursing his nightmares for not letting him sleep longer, as well as the Super Soldier Serum for stopping his constant need for rest - but that morning he got up and changed into his training clothes more willingly than he could ever remember doing so.

By the time Steve joined him running around the forest next to the Compound, Bucky had been running for well over two hours and was strongly considering doing some other sort of training - perhaps even trying one of those simulations Stark was always bragging about but Bucky had never worked up the courage to try. He was just about to duck off to the side of the path and stretch off, when Steve began to talk.

"Where were you yesterday, Buck?" The man did not sound out of breath in the slightest despite the mildly ridiculous speed the two were running at - one of the better perks that came with the Serum. "I couldn't find you anywhere."

Bucky strongly considered lying to his friend, before deciding that a vague portion of the truth would work just as well. "Natasha and I went into the city."

"Oh," Bucky frowned at this response from Steve, he would have thought the man was glad that he was trying to socialise a bit more, especially with someone who wasn't him.

"Why were you looking for me?"

"I was just going to ask if you wanted to come to the VA with Sam and I, they were running a day for people to meet each other and I though you might want to go."

This response made Bucky even more glad that he had not been around, Steve wouldn't have been thrilled with him for declining but Bucky also knew that he had no desire to be forced into that sort of thing. Besides, that sort of event was always very awkward and people often expected you to be able to share your story, something Bucky was not comfortable with in the slightest. Bucky would have quite happily allowed the conversation to die off at that point, but apparently Steve disagreed.

"So, where did you and Natasha go?"

"Just this little place she knows." Bucky answered, not wanted to give Steve more details than necessary.

"That's nice, maybe we could go there some time." Steve smiled at his friend but Bucky did not return the gesture, nor did he respond to the suggestion. As much as he appreciated Steve's efforts, the man would never leave Bucky alone if he went to the Café and found out the sort of people who worked there.

Falling back into silence - neither comfortable nor the opposite - Bucky continued to run with Steve for another lap before making his way back towards the Compound and entering the gym. Deciding that maybe he wouldn't try anything new after all, he strung a new reinforced punching bag and began to hit it, doing his best to rein in his strength and not destroy. Despite his best efforts, he still went through a couple of the bags before he left that morning, returning to his room before making his way to breakfast.

Upon moving into the Compound, it had quickly become apparent to Bucky who should be allowed to make breakfast and who should no longer be allowed into the kitchen. Stark had tried cooking pancakes one day in his first week, but had become distracted by a new design idea for his suit halfway through and so any half passable food he had managed to make was well and truly burnt. The only upside of him offering to cook was that they almost always got to eat out on those mornings, and Pepper had quickly taken him off the rota. Pepper herself was... an interesting cook to say the least. She made the best muffins Bucky had ever tasted, but she had tried to stray from this signature dish one morning and somehow created the oddest looking - and worst tasting - bagels any of them had ever come across. Steve always insisted on making the sort of English breakfasts he remembered from before the war - though they had all lost count of the numbers of times he had lost patience with the new-fangled technology and thrown something or other across the room. Natasha was by far the best cook out of them, as she almost always made foreign dishes which came out perfectly - in fact Barton had once claimed that she made a better cook than she did an assassin, a comment which had ended with him not leaving the vents for over a week as Natasha tried to attack him for the backhanded compliment. Barton himself was no longer allowed to cook, after that one time they had ended up standing outside the Compound in the snow for three hours with smoke pouring out of all available windows. No-one could quite explain what had happened - not even the man himself - but Pepper had decided that it might be best both for everyone's physical health and her mental state, if he avoided using the room again. Sam was safe to make breakfast, though his meals were often comprised of orange juice - which Bucky had been disgusted to find out he drank straight out of the carton - and toast with various combinations of fruit. Banner had only cooked once in the entirety of Bucky's stay and it had been almost amusing to the assassin as everyone tried to persuade him to make more French toast - though Bucky could not deny that the food had been incredible.