[oom] I'm right here beside you

[from_the_outside]

 Sleep is a joke.

It's not just the intel that she stays up sifting through, blue light straining her eyes; it's not just the coffee she drinks, trying to keep her brain sharp and her thoughts on track. 

It's time.

Minutes that slip away, that she can't get back. Hours that tick ponderously past. She lies alone in her bed and can't close her eyes because if she does, if she sleeps, it's another night gone, another night closer to the day Bucky goes back under and –

So she stays up and works. 

It means that when she waits for him in the morning to come find her before they meet with T'Challa and the others, her skin is pale and translucent and she has that sick feeling of an all-nighter, fatigue poisons running rampant through her bloodstream – but she has a list of observations from her analysis, and two mugs of coffee kept warm on the credenza: one pale with milk and sugar, the other black and as strong as her little coffee maker could handle.

Comments

[from_the_outside]

"They're just candles," she says, amused and more than a little touched.

(When was the last time someone said she was amazing?)

She tips her head, lets a few more waves of her hair fall over her shoulder for his fingers to brush through. "Not even real ones."

[nerves_of_ice]

"They look real enough to me."

He coils a lock of hair around his index finger, lets it untwist, and does it again.

[from_the_outside]

She watches as he twirls her hair around his finger, something warm and fond playing around her mouth.

"You like it in curls?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"Yes. And without them, too," he adds. "But yes."

[from_the_outside]

"Good to know."

She files that information away, like she does every time she discovers a new like or dislike of his. The white suit? Like. A red dress?

Well. "Do you want some music?"

The quiet is nice, too, but she came prepared, just in case.

[nerves_of_ice]

He finishes coiling another lock of hair around his finger and looks up at her.

"Do you?"

[from_the_outside]

"I asked you first," she says, amused. "I can take it or leave it."

She has a lot of options, tonight. Small ones. Choices he can make, if he wants to, or that she can make if that's what he prefers. All of them just a little more she gets to know about him.

For now, she just watches his fingers in her hair, the way he gently coils it and lets the resulting ringlet go.

[nerves_of_ice]

"In a while then, maybe," he says, after a moment's careful consideration -- and an equally careful sideways look at her, one he doesn't even realize he's giving, as he keeps coiling lock after lock of her hair. "It's nice like this, right now."

[from_the_outside]

"Okay."

She brushes her hair off her other shoulder and lets it slip down towards his hand. The sky is turning dusky purple and the sunset is just a thin red line along the horizon; soon they'll only have the starlight and these little battery-powered candles to see by.

But the stars in Wakanda are so bright, it's not going to be a problem. "It is nice."

It's funny how two city mice like them can find peace and contentment out here in the middle of nowhere. It must be the company.

[nerves_of_ice]

He finishes twisting every lock he can reach, and stretches up to brush his fingers over her cheekbone, studying her face.

[from_the_outside]

She tips her head into his touch, watching him with warm eyes.

Who knows what he sees when he looks at her like this. Something good, she thinks. Hopes.

(Sometimes she thinks about Tirana, and wonders what would have happened if they'd actually made it there. Would this? Would any of it?)

[nerves_of_ice]

He doesn't say anything, not yet. Instead, he cups her cheek in his hand and studies her for a few moments longer before he leans over to kiss her.

[from_the_outside]

She leans into his kiss, her free hand going to his cheek, and returns it soft and sweet and lingering.

Every one of these kisses is a treasure. She's lost count of how many there have been, but that doesn't mean she doesn't hoard each one like coins in a piggy bank for safekeeping.

[nerves_of_ice]

He tips his forehead against hers when the kiss breaks and just stays there, breathing slowly.

"You bring me to my knees," he murmurs, eventually.

[from_the_outside]

She smiles at that, her thumb running back and forth over the line of his cheekbone. "The feeling's mutual," she tells him, her voice soft.

She's not used to surrendering. But he makes her feel safe enough to go ahead and put her hands up. "You're so good to me."

It's not something she understands, always, but she's grateful for it. Always.

[nerves_of_ice]

Not good enough, he thinks, and promises himself to do better. To be better.

"I want to be," he says aloud.

[from_the_outside]

She shifts to curl around him, bracing herself with am arm over his hips and her legs brushing against his back, looking at him with a smile as she smooths his hair back from his forehead. "You are," she says, with absolute certainty.

"Better than anyone's ever been." He knows all her sharp edges and flaws; he knows her priorities and how they can't be negotiated; she argues with him and worries him and she's too damn reckless for her own good. And he likes her anyway.

She leans to kiss him again, smiling. "Believe me."

[nerves_of_ice]

He puts his arm around her, supporting her back, and draws her a little closer as he returns her kiss.

"I will, if you say so," he tells her.

[from_the_outside]

"Smart man," she teases, and loops her free arm loosely around his neck, nudging her thighs against his back so he can lean against her legs if he needs support.

How he could ever think she had a real choice to make is beyond her.

[nerves_of_ice]

"Okay, well, I don't know about that," he drawls.

[from_the_outside]

"Hmmm."

It's thoughtful as she idly toys with his hair at the back of his neck. "Good point. Let's not go too far."

But he's so close and the wine is starting to warm her from the inside out, so she just leans back in to kiss him again, instead of saying anything else.

[nerves_of_ice]

A slight shiver runs through him as she trails her hand over the nape of his neck. He kisses her again as she curls around him, keeping his arm around her, running his fingers lightly up and down her arm.

[from_the_outside]

His fingers leave goosebumps as they ghost along her skin, and it's not even that cool, although the temperature has dropped a little since the sun went down.

"You make me very happy," she murmurs, smiling, when this kiss breaks.

The week and the world and her life and his are all too damn complicated, but this one thing isn't; it's as simple as could be.

[nerves_of_ice]

"Good. You deserve to be happy."

He still can't fathom how he's someone who can help her feel that way, but he'll accept it and be grateful for it.

[from_the_outside]

You do, too, she wants to say, but this moment's too nice to see his expression turn rueful or to watch him shake his head, so she has to just hope he sees it in her eyes and doesn't argue.

She runs her fingertips over the nape of his neck and along his shoulder, then lifts her hand away so she can get her cup of wine and sip at it. "This really doesn't affect you at all anymore, does it?" she asks, lifting the cup.

"The alcohol, I mean." He clearly still enjoys the taste, the little rituals assigned to it.