Man Out of Time - A Captain America / Avengers Fanfiction

Chapter 4

A switch of viewpoint into our little-known Marvel character. Thanks to everyone who's read this so far and clicked the little gold star.Reviews make me smile!

X

Chapter 4

"Who's that?"

Bernice looked up from the picture she'd been bringing to life, her blue pastel pencil poised where she'd been having trouble adding just the right depth of blue to the stranger's eyes. He looked sad, but perhaps that was just the melancholy strains of BrunuhVille bleeding into her art? The gothic music was adding a wistfulness that probably hadn't existed when he'd helped her pick up her pencils and looked, just for a moment, as though she were a ghost.

"Just some friend of my grandmother's," Bernice said, trying to sound nonchalant. "At least I think he was an old friend. That's who he claimed to be."

She didn't add that her grandmother had seemed happier than she'd been in years, waiting for an old friend from the Office of Strategic Services, predecessor of the CIA, to visit. Grandma had always been tight-lipped about her former service as a spy, denying she'd been part of the French Resistance and donning a look akin to a Cheshire cat whenever asked about the photograph of President Roosevelt handing her a medal. Bernice had been expecting some geriatric old man with a cane, not the attractive young man coming to life upon her canvas.

"Do you think your grandma might be sweet-talked into setting me up with him?" Jacquie asked, caressing the canvas where his shirt was buttoned almost all the way up to his collar. "He's pretty hot. Even if he is dressed like a dork."

"Hey!" Bernice protested, pushing away her roommate's hand. "Now look what you've done! You smudged it! I haven't hit it with Krylon yet!"

"Sorry," Jacquie said, wiping the pastel that had lingered on her hand onto her pants and then frowning when it left an oily smudge. She stared at the picture, giving it a look halfway between admiration and lust. "Who is he?"

"Who knows?" Bernice said, giving her a shrug that belied the impulse which had compelled her to draw him in the first place. "Just some guy."

"Some guy, huh?" Jacquie said, giving her a knowing grin. "This is the first guy who's caught your interest since ix-nay on the Ike-May dumped your sorry ass."

Bernice looked down at her pastel-stained hands, the oil crayons bleeding into the tiny cracks in her skin. Yes. This was the first man who'd caught her interest since Mike had broken off their engagement. One minute he was telling her how special it would be to have a graduate of the New York School of Visual Arts as his wife, encouraging her to paint him in every pose imaginable, including many that would never see the light of day. The next thing she knew, Mike was spouting brown-shirt ideology and telling her he had better things to do than associate with a starving artist who wasn't "woke." That had really hurt. Only Grandma had ever encouraged her to pursue an impractical career such as art, forever wistful about an artist friend who'd been killed in the Great War.

Bernice looked up at her roommate and best friend, her hair dyed cherry-red even though she was Asian. It was a great joke amongst the other art students that her South Korean friend Jacquie, whose real name was Jae-Hwa, dyed her hair red and curled it to look American, while Bernice, who was American, straightened her hair and dyed it black.

"You going to show your grandmother?" Jacquie asked, holding both hands out in front of her and creating a little 'camera' with her fingers while she looked through the imaginary lens at the man on the canvas. She knew Bernice and her great-grandmother were pretty tight.

"Nah," Bernice said, and then changed her mind. "Maybe."

Grandma had been floating on air ever since the black man with the scary eye-patch had barged into the room, demanding to know just who she thought she was, calling in favors from names Bernice had only ever heard whispered amongst her aunts and uncles to get somebody to pay her some heed. With Midtown in shambles and the sudden realization they were not alone in the universe, Grandma must have rattled some very important cages to get somebody to pay attention to her ramblings about the man on the television. She hadn't been frightened of the black man one bit, but asked Bernice to run down to the kitchen and rustle up some tea and cookies. By the time Bernice had gotten back, the two had been laughing and slapping each other on the back as though they were old friends.

Perhaps the man who'd bumped into her in the hall was an old flame's grandson? If he bore any resemblance at all to the man grandma had been hoping was still alive, perhaps this picture would bring her pleasure?

"Grab that can of Krylon so I can set these colors," Bernice said, pointing at a white can of spray varnish up on a shelf next to her collection of tiny blown-glass animals. "I think I will bring it with me next time I go. It will give me something to show her besides sketches of naked men."

Their eyes strayed over to their portfolios, both girls taking the same 'Human Form' class this semester, and giggled. Bernice's style of art tended towards fantasy while Jacquie was a modernist, but both girls enjoyed sketching the models who posed nude while giddy college students sketched breasts the size of watermelons and penises that hung all the way to the floor. Bernice's cheeks flushed at the memory of her grandmother's handsome visitor eyeing her artwork and giving her a raised eyebrow as she'd gathered it from the floor.

"I dunno," Jacquie laughed. "I kinda like those naked men. I've never been in an art class so crowded as sour-puss Crowley's Human Form class!"

The girls laughed as Bernice sprayed the picture with layer after layer of clear varnish, giving a three-dimensional quality that only enhanced the sadness she'd captured in his eyes. With less than one semester to finish before she had to find a real job and dreams of being Mrs. Mike Farrel now as shattered, Bernice hadn't been in the mood for laughter. It felt good to laugh again.

Jacquie grabbed her portfolio and headed out for her next class, leaving Bernice alone to contemplate her masterpiece. Her hand reached up to brush the downturn of his lips and trace the shape of his strong jaw. Yes. Grandma Peggy would be pleased.

"Whoever you are," Bernice said to the man in the picture. "You made my grandmother very happy."

X

Ahh! A glimmer of hope for two lonely people. Don't forget to hit the little gold 'like' star on your way out and let me know your thoughts. Thanks for reading!