Chapter Text
For 5 days, Stark and Rogers are having a fight. Barnes can tell because there are no more trips to Manhattan (thank Marx), no more phone calls from Stark, but three calls from Potts.
“I’m not going to apologize for him, that’s his job,” she says, “but he was really rude. I want you to know that I told him that.”
“Thanks, Pepper.”
“Are you okay out there in Brooklyn by yourself?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“I know it’s not easy. But it’s not for Tony either. He was a jerk the other night, but he’s been through a lot.”
“I get that. I do.”
“So just give each other time, okay?”
“Okay.”
Whatever Stark did to deserve her is not enough.
Rogers walks a lot – and runs a lot, ugh – during the 5 days. Barnes is hungry every minute from all the activity. He sees a lot of Brooklyn.
To the southeast is a large park with good running trails and workout equipment. Barnes becomes intimately acquainted with these trails and only occasionally has to stop himself from using his metal arm to pull apart the chin-up bars, etc.
There’s a big war memorial in the park with both their names prominently inscribed. Rogers stands in front of it for 22 minutes their first day in the park. But there are no bugs on the workout gear, so if he says anything, Barnes doesn’t know.
It’s just past dawn, and a light frost tips the grass. It’s pretty but a reminder that no stores seem to carry any damn handkerchiefs. Barnes wipes his nose on his sleeve.
The fight with Stark brings the return of Rogers’s sad expression. Fucking Stark.
This is a particular difficulty of the mission: how to erase Rogers’s sadness while maintaining distance. How to suggest the comfort of a long bath or a grilled cheese with ham. A white mocha can fix almost anything for a little while.
Hey. Note: it is useful knowledge for living to have a list of things that are good no matter what.
CONFIRM
Rogers walks, and mopes, and occasionally sits at a restaurant or in a park to draw and mope.
Barnes has a much better time, following at a cautious distance. He finds a store that sells sheets. Clean sheets and a thick mattress pad improve the crunchy mattress. Rogers finds a little café he likes that has a sleazy diner across the street that’s more Barnes’s speed. Their coffee is terrible, but he is working his way through the menu. He’s pretty sure pancakes are something he has liked for his entire long life.
But charging his phone at coffee shops is inconvenient. On the second day of the fight, Rogers has stomped up and down the streets for 5.2 hours. As Barnes is wearily unlocking his door, the old lady from 3A sticks her head out into the hallway.
“Young man.”
She is looking straight at him.
“Young man, come here please. I don’t want Eleanor to get out.”
Greater mission secrecy required. This apparently means interacting with neighbors to maintain cover identity.
He moves to the door and, at her beckon, squeezes through the narrow gap while the cat seen on his first night tries to escape.
“Drat you, Eleanor,” the woman says.
Then, to him, “she always wants to get out, even though she never goes any further than the landing.”
The cat is winding around his legs and purring as if he were an old friend.
“She likes you.”
What does one do to a cat.
“Should I pet her?”
“Well, feel free, but there’s no obligation.”
The cat sits and yawns wide, showing teeth like needles. Better leave it be.
“Come in, we’ll have a talk.”
She grabs his elbow with her small hand and steers him toward her front room, pushes him onto the sofa.
“Sit there.”
She disappears into her kitchen. Amid the clatter and beeping, cat Eleanor jumps onto Barnes’s knee. He presses back into the sofa, hands still, and stares at the creature. Estimated weight 3 kg. Currently shedding hairs, cream with brown tips, onto his jeans. She blinks her pale green eyes at him and pushes at his knee rhythmically several times, then perches on his leg and purrs.
Does he call for the old lady. Cat Eleanor has already demonstrated that her claws are scalpel sharp, and those teeth.
The purring could be a trap. But his metal arm ought to be impervious. He reaches out with his left hand and strokes the cat’s head. She stretches her neck and purrs harder, a thrum against his leg. He scratches a little behind her ear, and she makes a high-pitched sound.
“She doesn’t usually take to people,” the old woman says.
She’s carrying a tray with mugs and a plate on it. An ancient urge rises to get up and take the tray, but the risk of severe puncture wounds is too great if he moves.
“Eleanor’s a tough customer. You must be high quality.”
Assessment: high quality assassin, fighter, and spy. Cats are predators. Maybe cats are attracted to the tough and deadly. He scratches a little more firmly, and Eleanor rises, pads over and snuggles down on his lap.
She is purring, right on top of all his tender parts, and that’s where all her claws are. Terrifying.
The old lady hands him a mug with a picture of the Brooklyn Bridge on it.
“I made it with milk and sugar the way I like it. Is that all right?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
It’s tea. But, as tea goes, not awful.
“So,” the old woman says, settling into the armchair she slept in when he first saw her, “you and Eleanor are friends for life. I’m Esther.”
“Jim.”
“So Ollie tells me. I must say, so far you’re a very quiet neighbor.”
He nods.
The old woman grins and hands over the plate. It has cookies on it. He takes one. Chocolate, cinnamon, dried cherry. It’s good.
“Listen,” Esther says, “what I’m about to say to you is not exactly legal.”
Oh ho.
He stops scratching Eleanor briefly. The cat makes a set of holes in the fold at the top of his thigh. He resumes his labors.
“But this building is neither fancy nor organized. You may have noticed.”
“Yes.”
“Have another cookie. Anyway. Since Gloria died, I know there’s no power over in your place. I wanted to say, once you get that worked out, as long as you pay a share, I don’t mind if you splice my cable.”
Splice her. Is that a euphemism?
“For the TV.”
Oh. Oh good.
“Don’t need TV,” he says, “but I could pay to splice electricity.”
The woman grins.
“Deal! Better to pay me than those ConEd bastards.”
“How much.”
“I’m not out to cheat you, Jimmy. I’ll keep this month’s bill for comparison and you can look at the bills going forward. Pay the difference, plus say – fifteen dollars for my troubles?”
It’s gonna be forty, lady, but we can have that argument when the bill comes in.
“Sure. Thank you.”
“Have another cookie. Now, is there anything you need to know about the neighborhood? And feel free to tell me absolutely everything you’ve ever thought, said, or done. I have been stuck for ages with only Ollie and Lidia for company, and I’ve heard every story they have to tell a hundred times.”
Required responses completely unclear.
“Um.”
“Have another cookie.”
“Thanks”
Barnes replays the entire paragraph while he chews.
“Where can I do laundry?”
“Oh no, don’t tell me you’re going to be boring.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“How terrible.”
She leans forward in her chair and glares at him.
“Jimmy Buchanan. Are you shy?”
Is ‘shy” going to make you stop pestering me.
“Yes.”
“Oh well, no matter. I’ll pry it all out of you eventually. I have a washer and dryer here that you’re welcome to use for the price of eating baked goods and fixing a few things around here. There used to be laundry in the basement, but it’s been so long since the lights worked down there that who knows?”
“Okay.”
“Just knock any time. As you can tell, Eleanor will be happy to see you. Have another cookie, you look starved. Does your stove work over there?”
“Works, yes.”
She looks at him over the top of her spectacles. It is an expression that strikes an ancient fear in him. He has the physical urge to clasp his hands behind his back, lower his voice, and promise to be good.
Pretty sure the Asset never got glared at by tiny old ladies.
Absolutely sure no one ever gave the Asset homemade cookies.
Barnes for the win.
“But do you use it?” she asks.
“Don’t know how to cook.”
Esther sighs at the ceiling.
“Do young people these days learn anything useful? Sure, you can make things go blinky on the world wide web, but can you sew on a button? Can you feed yourself?”
Barnes has a list of all the useful skills he possesses, most of which would probably send this slightly bonkers old lady screaming.
“I can sew a button. Mended a tear in these jeans.”
“Well at least that’s something. But you can’t cook.”
“No.”
“What do you live off of?”
“Mochas and grilled cheese.”
“Young man, that is not a balanced diet! There’s not a vegetable in there!”
“They put vegetables on grilled cheese now.”
“Oh DO they. How marvelous for the modern age.”
Noted: never introduce this woman to the redhead.
CONFIRM
Confirm.
“You’ll come for dinner tomorrow,” she says, “five pm. I’ll teach you how to make grilled cheese.”
“Can’t commit to the time. I have things I need to do. My schedule is different every day.”
Esther purses her lips at him and glares again. The conversation is so alarming that Barnes leans back, which makes cat Eleanor dig her front claws into his hip again.
If Rogers only knew.
He would probably give himself a hernia from laughing.
“Very well,” Esther says, “I won’t be a stickler on the time. But you’ll show up.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Now I’ll trade you cat for plate.”
Cat Eleanor protests for a scary moment, but Esther detaches her from his lap. Then she steers him up and out the door – in under 30 seconds he’s standing in the hallway with the plate of cookies.
“I know you’ll be back. You have to return the plate,” Esther says, and shuts the door.
The cookies provide excellent fuel for his late-night wiring project. By 0120, his apartment has power. Rogers has long been asleep, so it’s safe to turn on all the lights. This illuminates the disgusting state of the apartment (that death sofa has to go), but it’s satisfying nonetheless.
The third day of the fight is cold and rainy. Rogers, because he is terrible, goes for a run anyway. Barnes has looked online and knows that Rogers’s building has a gym. But no. He wants to run in the rain. The chill makes Barnes’s shoulder ache at the seam with the metal arm.
Bad things about the day:
- running in cold rain
- reduced caloric intake (the four remaining cookies) owing to disinclination to get his remaining clothing wet by going to Starbucks
- the scope shows that Rogers has from somewhere obtained a tiny laptop: an uncloned laptop and therefore a critical gap in intel
Good things about the day:
- the crummy building’s centralized hot water system never runs cold
- by 1600, the apartment is much cleaner; he has even dragged the death sofa to the empty apartment across the hall and obtained from there an armchair that smells only of dust
- he is on time for his cooking lesson with Esther
Rogers has ordered two pizzas and is sitting in front of his television, feet up, sketchbook on his knee and a stack of books by his side. The rain blows at an angle outside. Even Rogers won’t go outside in this, surely, without a good reason. Barnes knocks on Esther’s door and hears the rapid tap of cat Eleanor’s feet behind the wooden door.
“Not too busy after all, I see,” Esther says when she opens the door.
“No.”
Cat Eleanor stands up on her hind legs, balancing her front paws on his knees, and says hello in cat. Esther smiles.
“She wants you to pick her up.”
REFUSE
Higher likelihood of claw holes from picking up or not picking up.
DANGER
Eleanor makes holes in his kneecaps. He picks her up and drapes her on his shoulder, where she purrs into his neck and presses her cold, wet nose against his ear. Barnes learns that the area around his ear is extremely ticklish.
The mission imperative is a sound in the back of his mind a little like “eeeeeee.”
The technique of grilled cheese is straightforward. Barnes makes note of the supplies needed. Esther, for all her smart comments, is as thorough as the old Japanese man. She moves slowly, talking the whole time about the merits of cast-iron pans, the general pestiness of Eleanor, and the only trustworthy grocers in the neighborhood.
“The cheese looks different,” he says as she slices.
She hands him a piece. Its flavor is akin to sour, very strong. He wants more.
“You won’t find good sharp cheddar most of the time in ones you can buy. Too expensive, and many people, who are wrong by the way, find its flavor too strong.”
“I like it.”
“As well you should.”
Then she launches into a tirade about types of cheese, varieties of bread, and apparently infinite condiments.
Barnes feels dizzy with possibility.
The next morning provides more of the same cold drizzle. Barnes declines the opportunity to run in the rain. Again. It’s more important to establish surveillance in Rogers’s apartment.
The front door lock is no problem. The one on Rogers’s apartment is actually a minor challenge and takes 2.1 minutes of delicate struggle before it pops open.
APPROVED
Confirm.
Barnes hooks his own laptop up to Steve’s and sets his little spyware program installing. He sweeps for bugs and finds only three. The ones in the bedroom and doorway he destroys. The one in the kitchen is barely larger than a seed, and when he touches it, his earbuds crackle.
“Pardon me, Sergeant,” Building says, “that particular device is mine. I assure you that I monitor only Captain Rogers’s well-being.”
MISSION ASSIST
Yeah, no kidding.
“Confirm.”
He leaves that one alone. His own bugs seem kind of sad now, being only moderate-range. Maybe he can butter up Building and get some of the better ones. Unclear how to talk up a piece of architecture.
The apartment is comfortable to look at, with furniture that invites lounging. The thermostat is set too low; Barnes turns it up so Rogers won’t catch cold.
The refrigerator is practically empty. It contains a bag of apples, a nearly empty container of milk, and a package of sliced ham. Nutrition: insufficient.
SELF
Excuse me?
SELF
Are you telling me to go grocery shopping?
CONFIRM
Confirm.
Barnes looks in the sketchbook on the sofa. There are many quick sketches of the past few days: a boat at the Navy Yard, the corner café where Rogers has already eaten three meals. His own face again, with ‘where are you?’ written underneath it.
It would be easy to take the pencil and write ‘here.’
It is tempting to do so.
But Barnes knows, from present experience and download-memory that Rogers is – has always been – stubborn enough for twenty-seven standard humans. If Barnes wrote that note, Rogers would turn Brooklyn upside down, making surveillance/protection impossible.
Even Esther might quail before Rogers with his chin stuck out and his feet planted wide. But wouldn’t that be worth observing.
He doesn’t write the note.
The rain has let up by the time Rogers returns from his run. Barnes is full of egg sandwich and coffee and has the advantage over his target of being entirely dry.
“Man, how did it get so hot in here?” Rogers says.
The signal is clear and strong.