ky (:

You spent the rest of the day cleaning up with Nat and scolding the boys for fighting as if they were teenagers (no offence to Wanda and Peter of course). 

All you wanted to do now was take a nice bath, light some candles, and listen to music. You enter your room and strip out of your clothes, throwing on a robe. It was your only robe actually. Bucky got it for you for your birthday last year. You remember him giving it to you so clearly. 

"Aw, Buck! Thank you so much." You smile as you pull the robe close to you. Bucky shuffles on his feet as he smiles back, a hint of red showing on his cheeks. 

"I remembered you saying something about wanting one because they look fancy. I saw it at the store and just had to get it. I'm sure you'll look great in it too. Oh- not that, you know, I would ever have a reason to see you in it or, like, want to. It's not something I thought about either for the record." By now his face was red and he was clearly flustered. You just laughed and gave him a hug. 

You smile at the thought of him getting flustered, and a slight blush rises to your cheeks. You don't mind the thought of making Bucky flustered. You definitely had a bit of a thing for him. He was extremely handsome, sweet and kind, and you know that if you were in a relationship he would protect you no matter what. You don't know how to talk to him about it though. So you don't. You just live your life knowing that if it's meant to be it'll happen.

You enter the bathroom and shut the door behind you. You turn on the water to the tub and let it fill while you find everything you need for your bath. As you're setting up the candles, you spot something out of the corner of your eye. There's a spider on the wall. Immediately you scream. You hate spiders. They terrify you to no end, and this one is huge. 

"Y/N? Are you okay?" You hear a muffled Bucky from behind your door. You're frozen in place, your eyes locked on the spider. When you don't answer, Bucky opens the door. He sees you gripping the counter and staring at the spider on the wall, fear evident on your face. He quickly realizes that you aren't in imminent danger and begins to relax.

"You're scared of spiders?" He asks. You nod your head and point at it. "Don't worry, I got it." He tears some toilet paper off of the roll and squishes the spider, throwing it in the toilet and flushing it down. He turns to you and smiles, "See? All better." 

"Oh my god. Thank you, Bucky." You sigh. "I know it seems silly, but spiders genuinely freak me out real bad." He chuckles and shakes his head.

"No way, I get it. Steve used to be scared of 'em too. Had to kill 'em all when we were kids." You both laugh but it quickly stops when you both realize you're only in your robe, and in the midst of the spider problem the belt has come loose, almost exposing your bare chest. You quickly pull it closed and blush while Bucky turns around, also blushing. 

"You know," he starts without turning around. "You're cute when you're scared." Hearing this, your eyes go wide and your cheeks turn pink. You walk in front of him so you can see his face. His eyes never leave yours.

"You're really cute when you come to my rescue." You say, he smiles and you can't help but smile back. "It's almost like you're my hero or something." You giggle. He chuckles and his hands come up to cup your face, his thumbs run across your cheeks. He dips his face close to yours as he speaks.

"I like your choice of clothing tonight." You laugh and pull away from his grasp. 

"Get out, Barnes. I've already lost out on five minutes worth of warm water." He laughs and begins to walk out but turns around.

"Not until you give me a kiss." You can tell he even surprised himself with his comment. "I mean, I did save you from that menacing spider didn't I? The hero always get the girl." 

"Nice save, Buck." You laugh and wrap your arms around his neck. You're so close that your noses touch, and then you place you lips on his. You both pull away and smile. "Now get out, I'm still trying to take this bath."

"I could always join-" 

The next few hours are spent trying to find at least one present that would suit each of the Avengers. Almost everyone was gonna be at the compound this year to celebrate: Nat, Wanda, Tony, Peter, Steve, Bucky, Sam, Scott, Rhodey, Vision, and T'Challa. That's a lot of people to find presents for, and you honestly didn't know if you would be able to pull it off so close to Christmas. 

It took a lot of searching, but eventually you were able to find a present for everyone except for Steve. 

"Guys, I can't think of anything to get Steve." You whined.

"I can think of something." She smirks and Wanda laughs. You roll your eyes as a slight blush floods your cheeks. 

"I need real suggestions guys."

"What's not real about that?" Wanda giggles. "I'm sure he would greatly appreciate it, too." This time Nat's the one laughing. Both Nat and Wanda know about your pretty big crush on Steve. You couldn't help yourself, and really who could? It's Steve Rogers. There's no such thing as self control when it comes to that man.

"You guys know I don't want to tell him." You sigh, "We're friends, I don't want to ruin that with a silly little crush." With that you turn around, and you're glad you did. You spot the perfect present to get Steve. 

You walk over to the glass case and get a closer look. It's a gold pocket watch. On the inside of it is a star engraved into the gold. It was perfect. Steve has been talking about wanting a pocket watch for ages now, and you were kind of surprised you didn't think about getting him one as his present sooner. 

------

After the stressful day of late gift shopping, you head to your room to wrap all of the gifts. As you're wrapping Steve's gift, you think back to the conversation earlier. You really didn't want to tell Steve about your feelings for him. There was always the possibility of him not feeling the same way, and if that was the case then seeing him all the time would be awkward. You didn't want to ruin one of the best friendships you've had, even if that meant suppressing your feelings.

------

A few days later, you wake up to Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree being blasted throughout the compound. You sigh and roll over to look out the window. The sun has barely even fully come up, but you can't say you're surprised being woken up this early, it's Christmas day. You roll out of bed and try to make yourself somewhat decent, and your decent is some leggings, a t-shirt, and your hair pulled back into a ponytail.

You walk into the living room and see all the presents stacked under the enormous tree that Tony was so insistent on putting up. Tony, Bucky, Nat, and Scott are already sat around the tree waiting for everyone. By now a new song is playing through F.R.I.D.A.Y, Jingle Bell Rock. 

"I love this song!" Scott yells as he jumps up and starts dancing. You laugh and shove him so that he lands on the couch behind him. Feeling thirsty, you walk into the kitchen to pour a glass of orange juice. You find Bucky already in there, his head stuffed in the fridge. 

"Find what you're lookin' for there, Buddy?" You chuckle. Surprised, Bucky's head hits one of the shelves as he tries to pull it out. His face is tinted red as you laugh at his clumsiness. 

"Oh, Buck." You laugh. You squeeze passed him and grab the orange juice you came for. You look over at Bucky and he's just watching you, giving you a weird look. "You okay, Bucky? Did you hit your head too hard?" He shakes his head and gives you one last glimpse before walking away. You found it kind of strange, usually Bucky has some sort of smart remark to come back at you with, but he didn't say anything this time around. 

Glass of orange juice in hand, you walk back into the living room. Now everyone is here, and Tony's face is practically dripping excitement now that you've come back.

"Finally we can open the presents now!" He says as he rubs his hands together.

"You know, Stark, Christmas isn't just about presents, it's about -"

"Yeah yeah yeah family and friends yadda yadda yadda. Who's present am I opening first?" He cuts you off and all you can do is chuckle. You look around and see the only open seat is the one next to Steve. You glance over at Nat to see her smirking and you roll your eyes. Of course it was intentional. You make your way to the open seat and sit next to Steve. He looks at you and offers a small smile, but he looks nervous. 

"Want a drink?" You ask, offering a sip of your orange juice. He shakes his head and turns to watch Tony open his present from Rhodey. 

After about 45 minutes, over half of the presents have been opened. Steve has your present to him in hand, and he's getting ready to open it. 

"I hope you like it." You whisper. He opens his mouth to say something, but he quickly closes it and smiles. Something is off, but you're unsure what. Bucky and Steve are both acting really strange. Actually, it's not just them. This whole morning the others have been giving you quick looks, and when you notice them they immediately look away. Obviously something is up, but you have no clue what. 

You push the thoughts away and watch as Steve tears the reindeer printed wrapping paper. He opens the box that holds the watch, and when he opens it his eyes go wide. He looks at you, then the watch. You, the watch, you, the watch. You smile and he pulls it out. 

"Oh my- I love it, Y/N. I absolutely love it." You feel giddy knowing he really likes your gift. "Thank you so much."

"Anything for you." You smile, then blush. 

Soon all of the gifts are opened and the floor is covered in wrapping paper and boxes. You begin to clean up while everyone else heads to the table to have breakfast. As you're cleaning, you realize you never got a gift from Steve. Your heart sinks a little bit. Gifts aren't everything, and you aren't a very material person, but your gift to him was pretty special. Did he not feel the need to get you anything at all? Not even a keychain?

You throw away the last bit of wrapping paper and head to your room. You didn't feel like eating. It wasn't the fact that you didn't get a present from Steve that made you upset, it was the fact that this was proof he didn't feel anything other than friendship towards you. You closed the door to your room and sat on your bed. Your eyes began to water. For some reason, you had this glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe, he might have the same feelings for you as you do him. Sometimes you would catch him looking at you, and when you caught him his face would turn pink. Sometimes when you walked into the room you would notice his eyes go wide and his smile grow wider. Sometimes you would notice him getting flustered when you two were alone. But maybe you didn't actually notice these things. Maybe you just wanted them to be real and made yourself think they were really happening.

Twenty minutes pass and you hear walking outside of your door. You quiet your sniffling so that no one can hear, and then you hear the sound of something sliding underneath the door. You peer over the bed and see an envelope on the floor, and you hear the footsteps walk away. You stand up and grab the envelope. Your name is written on it, but it doesn't say who it's from. When you open it, it's just a piece of paper, but it says to go to the roof at six. Confused, you set the paper on your dresser.

Quicker than you expected, five thirty rolls around. You decide to put on a pair of jeans and a new t-shirt for this rooftop meeting. You're nervous about what this could be about. Nothing like this has ever happened, you don't have any idea what to expect. 

You walk into the living room and there's no one to be seen. 

"What the hell is going on?" You mumble to yourself. You make your way to the elevator and press the rooftop button. Your nerves quickly build up as you approach the roof. The elevator dings and the doors open. At first you don't notice anything, but you look down and see writing in chalk. It's a date, November 14th, 2018, and beside the date says, "The first day we met. I couldn't take my eyes off of you." There's rose petals lying on the ground, and little candles lighting a path that goes straight. The dates continue like a timeline. Your heart begins to pound, your hands start to sweat. This isn't what you think it is, is it?

"December 5th, 2018 - You beat me in a fight, and this made me intrigued by you."

"December 29th, 2018 - Neither of us could sleep, so we made pancakes at 2 a.m. and watched Christmas movies. It was this night that I realized how I really felt about you."

"January 11th, 2019 - You got a little too drunk and I carried you home. You were completely rocked, but you still blew me away with your beauty. Even if you were throwing up all over my car." 

"April 20th, 2019 - You took me to my first concert. Of course Bucky and Sam were there, but all I could focus on was you."

"July 17th, 2019 - I saw you go on a date with a man, my heart was broken."

"July 18th, 2019 - You stayed the night with me after getting your heart broken by that man. Little did you know we both we suffering." 

"September 20th, 2019 - I decided I was going to tell you how I felt, but I didn't know how."

"December 25th, 2019 -                            "

Next thing you know, Steve is in front of you holding a piece of chalk. Next to today's date he writes,

"I finally built up the courage to ask you on a date."

You watch him as he stands back up. He looks perfect in the moonlight, his cheeks lightly tinted pink and his eyes sparkling. 

"So, what do you say? Will you go-" You place your lips on his, cutting him off. His arms instantly wrap around your waist while yours wrap around his neck. You both pull away only when you have to breathe, and Steve breathes a sigh of relief. 

"I'm so happy you did that."

"I'm so happy you did this." You give him one last kiss before you pull away. 

Everything was great. You were watching a movie with your closest friends and were finally able to relax after having been on a week-long mission. Your eyes flicker to the wall made of windows and see that it’s rather dark out for only being three in the afternoon, and a few seconds later you hear the patter of rain pouring down onto the roof and streaking down the windows. There’s thunder, lightning, and heavy winds.

“Steve, Tony, shut up for two seconds.” Nat shushes their arguing, “This is my favorite part.” She holds one arm out toward them as if to say ‘stop.’ 

“I didn’t know Captain America could be such a blanket hogger.” Tony retorts, ignoring Nat’s request as he tugs the blanket back closer to him.

“Me?” Steve points to himself with a look of shock on his face. “Look at me! My legs are completely exposed!” Without looking, Bucky throws a spare throw blanket at him and you chuckle. Right as Nat’s favorite part is about to come up, the power goes out. You immediately fly up, your hand grasping Peter’s since he was already playing with your fingers. You despised the power going out, it always scared you. You hated the sound of everything in the building shutting down, leaving you in complete, ear-ringing silence. 

“Whoa, Y/N,” Peter sits up aswell at your sudden movement and turns his head to look back at you. “Are you okay?” You nod forgetting that he can’t actually see you. 

“Yeah, yeah I’m okay.” You whisper. You hear a groan that you already know came from Bucky as he presumably stands up.

“We were just about to see if the Muppets made enough money to get their studio back!” He groans. You hear Nat release a snort at his comment and you crack a small smile. 

“Well the backup generator isn’t working and I don’t entirely want to spend my day off fixing it, so here are some flashlights,” Tony says as he throws each Avenger a flashlight. You catch the one he throws to you against your chest and quickly turn it on. After a few seconds, everyone has theirs turned on.

“Why’s mine pink?” Peter asks, his face scrunched up, and you can’t help but let out a laugh at his pink light. He hits your arm softly with his light and you hit him with yours. You begin to feel better about your fear after distracting yourself.

“Well? What do we do now?” You ask the rest of the team. They all just shrug and look around. You get an idea and immediately smile. “Let’s play hide and seek!” Peter shoots up in excitement and Tony looks down with a hand settled on his forehead. When no one shoots the idea down, they decide to play and make you count first since you had suggested the game. 

“Make sure to count all the way to thirty, Y/N!” Sam yells. “And no peeking! I will know if you peek, I’m badass like that.”

“Okay, okay shut up and go hide.” You yell back as you try to control your giggles. You stand in the corner of the room and cover your eyes as you begin counting.

“28… 29… 30!” You shout. “Ready or not here I come!” You grab your flashlight and make your way through the dark compound. You made a rule that you can only hide on this floor so it wouldn’t be too hard to find everyone. First, you check the kitchen. You quickly find Clint hiding behind the door to one of the pantries.

“Really? I’m the first one?” Clint asks, a feigned look of hurt on his face. You just laugh in response and keep moving. 

After Clint it was Nat, then Sam, then Bucky and Steve who hid together in the bathtub, and then Peter. You couldn’t for the life of you find Tony, so everyone got together and went on a search to find him. Eventually, Nat found him stuffed underneath one of the couches. 

“Took you long enough,” Tony grunts as he slides out from his hiding spot. “It was starting to get a bit stuffy down there,” he smirks as he runs his hands down his shirt to rid of any dust. You just roll your eyes and shove his shoulder.

“It’s your turn, Stark.” You say. He holds his hands up and stands in the corner. You look around to find a spot, and right as you’re about to start walking, a hand grabs your wrist. You turn around and see Peter behind you, his strong hand wrapped lightly around your wrist and a finger against his lips. He tugs you in the opposite direction and you willingly follow. He pulls you into your room and points under the bed. You nod as he lets go of your wrist. The spot that he held was warm under his touch, and you can continue to feel that warmth even after he let go. You lightly touch it before you hear Tony yell:

“...30! Ready or not… here I come!” You quickly scramble to get under the bed with Peter. Once you get situated, you’re sat shoulder to shoulder with him. You turn to look at him and he looks at you. You’re very close. Very, very close. In fact, you were so much closer than you expected to be that you feel your breath hitch in your throat, and you hope to whatever God exists that he can’t hear your heartbeat drastically increasing in the complete silence. 

But he can hear it, and at that moment he wishes he had the courage to just kiss you and finally admit to you how he feels. He doesn’t do that though. Instead, he breaks your gaze and watches the crack underneath the door, watching for Tony’s penguin socks that you had gotten him for Christmas that year. 

You look down at your hands as you hold yourself up with your elbows. Just talk to him. You think to yourself, but you know it’s not that simple. This was the boy you had been crushing on for months now. This was the boy who would let you paint his nails for fun when you were bored. This was the boy who would help you prank Tony or Thor (and sometimes, when you both were feeling particularly annoying, Tony and Thor) just for the shits and giggles. You were terrified of ruining the friendship you two had created over your little (huge) crush. So you didn’t. You kept it to yourself for the last five months and tried to suppress your feelings. Although, suppressing your feelings for this boy was really hard at times, and this was one of those times. 

 “I think I hear him coming,” Peter whispers, looking over to meet your eyes once more. All you could do was nod your head, scared that if you opened your mouth to talk nothing would come out. Or worse, you wouldn’t be able to keep it shut. You were scared that if you opened your mouth all of your feelings would spill out and you wouldn’t be able to stop the waterfall of words that would pour from your slightly chapped lips.

Peter didn’t take his eyes off of yours, he scanned over your face as if memorizing every little detail, every little imperfection that he thought only made you even more perfect. You notice his jaw tighten and you wish you could read his mind, just to know what he was thinking in this moment. He lets out a low breath and slowly brings his hand to your face. His thumb traces lightly along your jaw, leaving goosebumps in its wake, then trails over your bottom lip. You feel goosebumps rise on your arms as a shiver runs down your spine. 

“I, I uhm,” Peter stumbles over his words causing you to smile. He sees your smile and relaxes slightly. “God, you’re so pretty.” He whispers. His hand rests on your cheek as he pulls you in for a kiss. You melt into him, using one arm to tangle your fingers in his hair while the other one holds you up. He removes his hand from your cheek and wraps his arm around your waist, pulling you as close to him as he can. In that moment, you forget about being squished underneath your bed, and you forget that you’re hiding from Tony. All you can think about is how Peter Parker called you pretty and is finally kissing you. You’re so full of emotion and blinded by the feeling of Peter’s soft lips against yours that you don’t even hear the footsteps enter your room.

“I told Clint I would stop by his house for a while to see the kids today, he said they were missing Aunt Natasha.” That was the first excuse, and it was understandable. Clint’s kids loved Nat and didn’t get to see her often. You weren’t very upset by that, but then excuses from all the others just kept rolling in.

“I have to go to Asgard to check in on my- uhm -Asgardian things.” 

“I have to go to a meeting down in D.C., I won’t be back until tomorrow.”

“Steve and I are taking a trip to Brooklyn, for old time’s sake.” 

“I have a, an um, you know, a science, um, science- science project!”

And that’s just to name a few.

You heard every excuse in the book until you were alone in the compound with no friends in sight. That was when you decided to throw yourself your own little party, which led you to make your trip to Walmart to pick up the personal birthday party essentials. In the back seat of your car was a chocolate cake, some birthday-themed plates and napkins, your favorite brand of pop, some streamers, and a pack of balloons. 

You grabbed all of your bags and held the cake in both hands and shut the door to your car with your foot. You stumbled your way through the doors of the compound and into the elevator. 

“Happy birthday, Miss (Y/L/N).” F.r.i.d.a.y. said as you stepped into the elevator. You smiled a small smile and thanked her. 

“At least someone wished me a happy birthday.” You mumbled to yourself. The elevator dinged and you stepped into the dark hallway. You weren’t surprised that the lights weren’t on, as you hadn’t been home for about an hour, but they usually turned on once they registered movement. You were confused as you walked down the hall, bags and cake still in hand. Your eyes were beginning to adjust to the light, and you thought you saw a figure standing in the kitchen. Right as you opened your mouth to ask if anyone was home, there was a voice.

“F.r.i.d.a.y, lights please.” Tony’s distinct voice rang through the room as the lights returned. 

“Surprise!” All of the Avengers who made up excuses upon excuses to not be here on your birthday were all sitting in the kitchen, smiles wide on their faces. You were shocked and had been slightly scared, the bags you were holding fell to the ground and the cake went in the air, landing face-first on the ground. 

“Guys oh my God!” You yell, your eyes beginning to swell with tears. You forgot about the bags of supplies you dropped that were intended to give you the party you wanted so bad. You forgot about the fact that the chocolate cake you planned on eating alone was now on the ground. Looking around, your friends did all of that for you. You don’t know how they planned it, but they did. Streamers were lining the ceiling and door frames, balloons were scattered all over the floor and in the air, your favorite flavor of cake was sitting on the counter in front of you with a candle stuck down the middle. You ran to them all and hugged them.

“I thought you guys forgot.” You chuckle as you wipe the stray tears of happiness from your cheeks.

“How could we forget?” Sam questioned. “It’s all you talked about the whole damn month.” You laughed and pushed his shoulder. 

“You have to make a wish!” Natasha said ignoring Sam’s comment, her voice giddy with excitement.

“Make sure you don’t tell anyone what your wish is,” Steve says with a finger pointed towards you. “If you do it won’t come true.” He finishes his sentence and boops your nose. You slap his hand away and laugh.

“Okay, okay. I’ll make a wish.” With you sitting in front of the cake, all of your friends gather around you and sing you the birthday song. You scan your eyes along the faces of everyone here. These people are your family. You love them unconditionally, and they love you. 

“Happy birthday dear, (Y/N). Happy birthday to you!” Nat pulls your hair back as you take in a breath and blow out your candles. Everyone cheers and the people sat closest to you, Nat and  Bucky, each give you a hug.

“What did you wish for?” Bucky nudges you with his elbow as he releases you from your hug. You put your hands up and back away.

“No-can-do sir,” You say with a snort. “Mr. Rogers over there said if I tell anyone my wish then it won’t come true.”