AU Milliways

[therighttime]

The door opens from one pub to the next. A rosy-tinted, warm little English pub filled to the brim with uniformed soldiers and local girls, crowing and laughing and being alive, really feeling it for the first time in longer than any of them would like to admit.

The woman who is leaving that particular pub is tall - very tall, inches over six feet - shapely in her 1940s olive dress uniform. Her make-up is fresh, her tie in perfect order, her hair is even curled in classic victory rolls (it took three showgirls three hours to make it happen, but they're all used to it by now).

Stephanie Rogers is grinning, flush-faced and filled with joy as she waves to a dark-haired soldier at the bar and steps purposefully into -- another bar.

She recognizes a shift, a difference immediately, and keeps one hand on the knob even as she frowns thoughtfully at the room around her.

Comments

[winter_never_left]

"You know, I have no idea," Jim says, frowning. Then he shrugs, obviously not terribly concerned. "Been out of touch for a while? You can practice small talk on me, I don't mind."

[therighttime]

Steph stares back. He's already criticized her for prying - unintentionally or not - and she shouldn't, really shouldn't, it's not her place at all. This isn't even her world, really.

"Wouldn't know where to start," she admits, quiet. She's still sitting beside him, one hand curled around her glass. And she needs another sip of it, too. "It's been a while since I had much to do with people outside the war."

USO show included.

[winter_never_left]

"Which war?"

She's reminding him of something. Bringing up something in the back of his mind. It's not a problem. He'll just watch and see what happens.

[therighttime]

"Don't know it has a name yet," Steph replies with a slight shrug, sipping her drink. It's good gin, smooth - Bucky would have liked it. "I suppose we'd call it the second Great War, if it were going to be anything.

"Wherea-- um, when abouts are you from?"

[winter_never_left]

He looks at her, fingers tapping on the bar, thoughtful.

"That's another one of those really hard questions to answer."

[therighttime]

Small talk is even harder than usual today.

"You're an interesting man, Mr. Samuels," Steph tells him quietly, lowering her glass to look at him.

[winter_never_left]

"Plenty of people tell me that," he says, with a faint twitch of a smile.

Sometimes they say it to him right before he kills them.

She's interesting.

[therighttime]

It's a different word when she uses it. The way he smiles when he can't answer questions like when, where, soldiers and army isn't right. He's not interesting, not really. He's pitiable.

With Bucky's face.

Steph nods slowly and doesn't smile back. "Hope it's a compliment."

[winter_never_left]

"Not usually." He shrugs, one-shouldered again. The right shoulder doesn't move so easily, even when he lifts that hand to push back overlong hair.

"I think it might be, coming from you."

[therighttime]

Her eyes track the movement. He looks messy, unkempt, but as comfortable as if he were in a matching uniform, as neat and trim as her own.

She'd called him interesting and she'd pitied him, yes, but that didn't make it an insult.

"That's how I meant it," Steph agrees, and holds his gaze.

[winter_never_left]

The man calling himself Jim looks back at her, unbothered by the gaze.

Maybe. Mostly.

"There's something about you," he says, easily, as if it's unimportant. "Don't know what it is, but I'm pretty sure I'll figure it out."

[therighttime]

"Pretty sure I'm one of a kind," Steph replies with a slight shrug, unsure of the way he's looking at her. "But honest, Mr. Samuels, you're a dead ringer for my best friend back home."

[winter_never_left]

"Yeah?"

Already sharp eyes sharpen further. He holds up his right hand, twists it a couple of times, glances up at her face. "This too?"

[therighttime]

Ah. Well, yeah. That would explain how odd his handshake felt. She's seen injuries in the last few days to last herself years of nightmares, but this man has a solution. In a way.

"No," Steph says carefully, tracking the movement of that hand, curious. Then she smiles, sudden and soft, fond. "But he'd probably think it was swell."

[winter_never_left]

He hadn't expected her to pick up on that.

"It is pretty swell." He flexes his hand a couple more times and grins, sudden and bright. "Tell me more about this friend of yours. What's he do?"

[therighttime]

"He's a soldier. Most everyone is these days, you know."

It's what happens when there's a war on. His grin might be bright but Steph's simple smile stays soft, a little more for show than before.

[winter_never_left]

"That'll pass," he says, taking a long drink. "Wars do that. You just gotta get through it."

[therighttime]

Steph lifts an eyebrow, head tilted to watch him. "It doesn't pass for long. People rise up when they're needed."

[winter_never_left]

"Do they?"

Honest question. In his experience, not so much.

... admittedly, his experience is, currently, not very much at all.

[therighttime]

Steph nods. "In my experience."

It's not much. She knows that, should admit it. But it's important, joining up, protecting the freedoms you use, the people you call your own, the future you'd be proud to see. To be able to announce I'm an American citizen with pride and be looked at with respect because you stand for the principles you fought for.

Her experience isn't much. Her feelings on the war and the men who fight in it beside her are very much indeed.

[winter_never_left]

"Sounds like you've got plenty of stories to tell," the man says, thoughtful. Looking at her as a person now, rather than a doll. "I think that means I ought to buy you a drink and listen."

[therighttime]

Stephanie tilts her head, a small humorless smile on her lips. "Not quite done with the first yet," she admits, apologetic as she lifts the glass into show him. "Thanks, by the way."

[winter_never_left]

Oh. He looks at his own drink, long since finished, and shrugs, and orders another anyway.

"No drama. See you around, maybe, Cap."

[therighttime]

Steph blinks and then smiles again, warmer and sweeter. "You always give up so easy, Mr. Samuels? I don't mind talking, honest, but there ain't much to tell really."

[winter_never_left]

He glances up and grins. "This ain't a place where you get very far by prying, Captain. Captain ... Rogers."

That -- it's strange, the words kind of kick something loose in his brain. He frowns, studying her again. There's no flash of red and white and blue about her, so why is he remembering a star?