Captain America: Totally Innocent (Patreon)

The great thing about working for Jane Foster was that she was obsessed. And as much as that sucked when it meant flying out to the middle of nowhere and setting up poles and cables for hours on end, it also meant that a lot of the time, Jane would get into a project and spend most of the day just sitting there, fiddling with knobs and dials and reading screens.

All Darcy had to do was check on her every few hours, get her to go to the bathroom, remind her to put in her eyedrops, and boom—she had earned her daily wage as a valued SHIELD technician.

Not that Jane made it easy for her, but Darcy had found out that if you managed to get her obscenely sized Thermos away from her and tempted Jane with some fresh coffee, she’d do just about anything. Even the stretches that the doctor had assured them would keep Jane from throwing her back out if she needed to run for her life on short notice. Which Darcy appreciated, because tiny as Jane was, Darcy was not carrying her away from Frost Giants again.

At the moment, they were in Avengers Tower, getting to play with Stark’s toys, and Darcy was happy to leave Jane to all the screens—she didn’t know why someone needed six screens at their desk instead of just one. Why not put a couch in front of the desk too? If you needed to look six different places at once, why not sit in three different places at once too?

But it seemed to make Jane happy, so Darcy left her to it and gave herself an unguided tour through the Tower. She didn’t know what she was hoping to do—maybe take a selfie with an Iron Man suit—certainly not cause any explosions. But the first thing she managed to accomplish was walk in on the kitchen where Steve Rogers was making a sandwich.

He looked up from the slice of Swiss cheese he was laying out. “Hey. Darcy, right?”

“Yeah. Hi. Mr. Rogers.”

She’d met Steve a little. Thor’s Avengers stuff tended to drag Jane along, which meant she got dragged along, so she’d, like, slept under the same roof as them when they all needed somewhere to crash and obviously superheroes weren’t going to let her stay at some creepy rape motel while they slept at the Hilton. But she wouldn’t say she was on a first name basis with any of them, besides Thor, who was dating her best friend and also only had a first name.

She didn’t want to call Steve ‘Captain Rogers’ like one of the SHIELD drones and obviously you couldn’t call him Captain America when he wasn’t punching Hitler in the face, so… Mr. Rogers… yeah, she sucked.

“Looking for something to eat?” Steve asked her.

“No, why would I—oh, because I’m in the kitchen. This is the kitchen.” Darcy looked around. Lots of stainless steel. A few messes. Not as much battle damage as she would’ve expected.

She tried to imagine the Hulk buttering an English Muffin. That probably never happened.

“I could make you another sandwich, no problem,” Steve said, gesturing to all the ingredients he had out.

Although feminism would probably never forgive her, Darcy declined to have Captain America make her a sandwich. She got a jar of Nutella from the pantry. Steve heated his sandwich in the panini press.

He’d lost a bet with Tony and gotten the services of the Starks’ personal shopper for eight hours, resulting in a wardrobe that only made him look like someone’s grandpa if you were descended from Paul Newman. Steve had put his foot down on anything too flattering—Clint had slipped the shopper fifty dollars to at least try and buy Steve a mesh top—but that just made it work harder on Darcy. It was withholding: the sturdy canvas workshirt, the pleated chinos… Darcy pictured him wearing a paisley bandana around his neck… maybe not shaving quite so close… maybe being just a little beat up, like how he’d looked after Dormammu caused all that trouble in Midtown…

“Pop?”

“Wha?” Darcy replied intelligently.

“Would you like some pop?” Steve asked, opening the refrigerator door for her. Various cans filled up the shelves in the door. He lifted a bottle of Mexican Coke up from a row. “This still has real sugar in it.”

“No thanks,” Darcy said, thinking there was something to be said for nice, respectable, Disney Prince Steve too. Would it be alright if I ate your ass? he’d probably ask solicitously while they cuddled, only in some really old-fashioned, polite sort of way. Darcy, I can’t help but suspect that it’s been a while since your ass has been eaten… I’d be remiss if I didn’t volunteer my services, after how you rocked my world—

“Bagel?”

“Bagel?” Darcy echoed.

“There’s a bakery nearby that sends us fresh bagels every day, free of charge. I hate to see them go to waste. We have some good spreads, some lunchmeat—I know a girl like you probably hates to eat between meals, but I think bagels make for a fine snack.”

The Devil won in Darcy: “Dude, are trying to fatten me up to cook me for a witch?”

“No,” Steve said flatly, so confused that she could see him asking himself if he was trying to fatten her up for a witch’s meal. “I just hate to see anyone leave here hungry. I kinda take it on myself to see that there’s something in the kitchen for everyone, whether they have a sweet tooth or a vegan phase.”

Oh my God. Oh my God. I yelled at Captain America for trying to get me to eat right. I’m going to hell. “I’m just not hungry, that’s all…” Darcy forced a laugh. “Most guys would say I could stand to lose a few pounds.”

This was a blatant lie and a wretched bid for sympathy and Darcy was still going to hell, but she got a laconic smile from Steve. “I doubt that. Most guys I used to know would vote you homecoming queen… I don’t think people have changed that much over the years.”

“Have you?” Darcy asked. It just slipped out.

“Have I changed that much?”

“Yeah. Would you still vote me for homecoming queen or…” Darcy moved her eyes about. “Maybe would you rather prefer someone like Pepper?”

Steve kept grinning at her. She didn’t think she was shaking him anymore. “Pepper’s a very beautiful woman, but… I could never come between her and Tony.”

Oh. He’s torturing me. I refused to let him feed me a sandwich and now I get tortured.

Now, if she were into Bruce, say, she could just brush up against him and comment on his cologne and maybe mention how long it’d been since she’d given anyone a blowjob. Steve wasn’t like that. He was old-fashioned. If she made the first move, he’d probably think she had a mental disorder. She had to let him make a pass at her. But he was all hung up on his lost love and being in the 21st century and skinny jeans being a thing. So he wasn’t likely to do that. So she could look, but not touch.

It was maddening.

Steve got his sandwich out of the press. Darcy was a little amused to see him gingerly take hold of it and move it onto his plate, jerking his fingers away as they were burnt by the crispy hot sandwich. So even Avengers did that.

He dusted crumbs off his hands and glanced at Darcy. Darcy wasn’t exactly dressed to be glanced at. She loathed the idea of a dress code—like, hello, she was an adult—and kinda gloried in SHIELD needing her… well, Jane… well, Thor… so bad that they had to put up with whatever she wanted to wear.

So she had on a Red Hot Chili Peppers band shirt, three different necklaces including a dog collar, hair she’d teased into several curls alongside her usual straight tresses, and a leopard-skin skirt over fishnet stockings.

And a lot of eyeshadow.

Steve must’ve thought she looked like the decline of Western Civilization. Darcy felt the need to explain that she didn’t actually terrorize anyone as part of a multiethnic street gang, she just went to the odd punk show and had once done ketamine.

Would it be too obvious if she wore a sundress and a boater cap and garters the next time she knew she would be in the same zip code as Captain America?

Steve crunched a bite of his sandwich. He winced and set it aside. Shallowed with a sour look on his face. “Too much mustard. With the way mustard used to taste, you needed a lot to really make it a part of the sandwich, but now… never mind. You don’t want to hear about that.”

Darcy would’ve listened to Steve tell her about the fall of the Roman Empire.