Avenger Arising → Bucky Barnes [3]

02|EMPTY GLASS

In the following days of Ally taking off to search for Bucky, insomnia became Clara's new companion. She would spend hours in her bed, eyes wide opened as she wondered if Ally was asleep or awake. The long minutes would drag into even longer hours but she refused to look at the clock. Music didn't help and telling Steve about her restless nights just seemed like a bother. Eleven o'clock morphed into twelve and then one. The time trickled by, marked only by the changing numbers on her Star Wars alarm clock. She thought that maybe sleeping pills would be a solution but also felt as if it was pointless.

She sat up in her bed and rested her hands on her forehead. Maybe it was just a separation issue, maybe Ally being away for so long was keeping her up at night. In the end, Ally was Clara's only family. Clara thought about it multiple times, wondering what to classify Ally. It came to her a few days before last Christmas, Ally was like Clara's older sister. She was her older sister. They were each other's family, which meant that Steve was her family too and more than anything, she wanted Bucky to be apart of her makeshift family as well.

Clara grabbed a hoodie from her bedroom floor and slipped it on before peering into the hallway. Everyone was asleep and she didn't want to wake anyone. She quietly made her way to the kitchen, in hopes of finding some milk to warm up. During the first year after Bucky saved Steve and Ally from the Helicarriers, before they defeated Ultron, whenever Ally woke up from a nightmare or couldn't sleep, she'd warm up some milk and sit in the stillness of the kitchen. Ally told her that her mother used to do that for her way back in 1930.

She leant against the counter as she waited for the milk to warm in the microwave. She wondered what it would have been like to have a mother who cared or what Nico, Kepler and Jovian Jones would've been like.

"What are you doing?" Valerie questioned, unwrapping tape from her knuckles. "It's one in the morning."

"I genuinely don't understand how you can ask me that."

"Just a conversation starter," Valerie shrugged, grabbing water from the fridge. "Can't sleep?"

"What gave it away?"

"The milk," Valerie pointed out. "Ally used to do it sometimes...have you heard from her?"

"Not since last month," Clara mumbled, taking the milk out of the microwave. "She's probably just busy."

"Probably."

"Why are you awake?" Clara asked curiously. "It's one in the morning."

Valerie raised her shoulders once more. "Same as you, couldn't sleep."

"You've been distant," she muttered out, her cheeks turning unnoticeably red in the dim kitchen light. "Ever since Ultron, you closed back up again."

"I was never open in the first place Clara," Valerie defended. "My orders were to stay with you and Ally, so I followed them."

Clara flinched. "I didn't mean it like that."

Valerie's face softened and she sighed. "I'm sorry," she apologized. "Ever since that little witch got into my head, I shut down and went back into Agent Runaway mode."

"Wanda isn't just a witch," Clara commented, upset that Valerie still saw her negatively. "She was a human with a sad heart following orders, just like you."

Valerie laughed. "C'mon Clara, when are you going to realize being nice all the time doesn't work?"

"When you realize being rude all the time doesn't work either."

Valerie went silent for a moment. Her mind raced as she watched Clara sink into a chair, probably regretting her choice of words. Valerie suddenly couldn't find her voice. She felt her cheeks flush hot and her stomach became heavy. Her heart pounded in her throat, threatening to break out. Her eyes stayed on Clara for a moment and she sighed. "I'm sorry."

Clara looked genuinely surprised as her mouth formed the perfect 'o'. "What?"

"Don't make me say it again," Valerie groaned. "But I'm sorry, being rude is my only weapon."

"Against what?" Clara's voice was soft and caring. "You are with good people, you don't need to shield yourself anymore."

"It's all I've known."

"When it was just Ally, you and I the first few months after S.H.I.E.L.D shut down, I wasn't used to having people stick around for so long...or be kind to me," Valerie explained. "All I've ever known is people leaving me."

"We aren't like that Val," Clara promised. "We are family."

Something in Valerie cringed and Clara noticed it right away. The story of Agent Runaway was one everyone knew well. Valerie was abandoned, found on the streets of Germany by none other than Black Widow. She was top of her S.H.I.E.L.D class but was aggressive and too violent. When things went wrong, she would run away but Fury couldn't risk such a talented and vicious agent to roam the streets alone. She was put under Maria Hill's order up until two years ago. Clara, Valerie and Ally had been working as a team. Searching for Bucky, helping the Avengers, working on small missions here and there.

"Do you think it's possible for someone to love me the way Bucky loves Ally?"

Clara's eyes widened. Out of all the things Valerie VanDyke could've said that early morning, Clara was not expecting that. Clara stared as if Valerie had just grown a pair of wings. Valerie was smart enough to know that was she said was a surprise. She could just imagine the sparks in Clara's brain, desperately trying to connect the dots. For another moment, they were completely quiet.

"I like you Valerie."

Valerie said nothing. She knew what Clara meant, she had known for a long time in fact. "I know."

Clara bit the inside of her cheek. "My foster parents always told me that liking a girl, when you're a girl, was wrong."

The corners of Valerie's mouth tugged upwards. "It's not."

"To some people it is," Clara rambled. "But you're so hard to piece together, I don't even know what I'm liking so much."

"I'm not a puzzle Clara."

"My entire life has been turned upside down," Clara ranted, her hands in the air. "Alchemy Jones is my legal guardian, Tony Stark makes jokes about how I eat pasta, Captain America doesn't like the way I sing. I'm not sure how out of all those things, liking you makes the most sense when I don't even know who you are half the time."

"Don't make things complicated."

"They already are," Clara put a hand through her hair. "My life isn't completely about avenging...I'm figuring out who I am too..and– and– I'm figuring out that I like girls."

"You don't like me Clara."

"But I do," she felt hot tears running down her cheeks. "And I know you feel the same way but you can't open up to people because you're scared they are going to leave you."

"Clara—"

She wiped her cheeks and put her empty glass of milk in the sink. "Never mind," she shook her head. "This all means nothing to you in the end anyways."

Valerie watched as Clara silently made her way back to her room. Ally Jones let the love of her life slip by her that same night without her knowing, while Valerie let the one good thing to happen to her, cry herself to sleep.

—

Clara bit the inside of her cheek. "My foster parents always told me that liking a girl, when you're a girl, was wrong."