i don’t wanna be your friend. i wanna kiss your neck.

Felicity let out a soft sigh, glancing over to the clock that hung above the stove in the kitchen for the umpteenth time in the last half hour. The postman should be dropping off the mail soon enough, and while she didn't want to give herself any false hope, she prayed to God that there would be a letter from Bucky amongst the usual bills and other items. She hadn't received a letter from him in well over three weeks now and, in those three weeks, she'd heard about what was going on across the Atlantic. The mere thought caused a sense of dread to course throughout her entire body. She knew of Steve's fate, a good friend of hers and Bucky's best friend, and she couldn't help but expect the worst in the absence of her own soldier's letters.

---

Peter was lost. He had been for a while now. Sure, he tried getting on with his life after everything that had happened, but that was easier said than done. Getting on with one's life was different from actually living it. He was just taking it all in, day by day, honestly just getting by. He knew that he wasn't the same person anymore, he knew that Aunt May noticed it too, but how was he supposed to act? He was still grieving, and he had every right to do so. While he'd gotten on with his life, and attempted to pick up from where he'd left off, furthering his education after high school and so on and so fourth, he wasn't truly living his life, and he didn't know if he ever would.

Lux's head hurt. She had spent the better part of the morning in the school library working on her Astronomy paper due next week. She shoved her hands into the pockets of her jacket and headed down the street. Maybe she'd get some coffee. Lux could use it. She hadn't been sleeping lately. It was always either working on schoolwork, never paying attention to the clock until it suddenly turned two in the morning, or just the simple fact that she couldn't sleep, no matter what. It was hell on her body, but somehow she made it through the day. Lux slipped into the small coffee shop, standing in the short line as she dug through her pockets for money and trying to decide what she wanted.

Bucky was nervous. He hadn't sent her letters in ages, even though he seemed to have gotten a letter from her every day. He had tried to write her letters, tried for ages, every free moment. But words just couldn't quite address how he really felt, how he wanted to tell her that he was coming home and wanted to really make her his girl. To make it all official. But he had never sent her a letter, and now he was standing outside her door building up the courage to talk to her. It was silly: Bucky being afraid to talk to a girl. He was a courageous person, had saved Steve's ass a couple times and he saved Bucky too. But gods, Steve. He was gone now. And that crushed Bucky. Eventually, Bucky lifted his hand a pressed the doorbell twice.

[ sorry this took so long, my internet sucks. ]

Felicity had lost count of how many letters she'd written him. She knew that it was silly, but she'd even continued writing him when his letters stopped completely. She knew that that probably meant that things were getting bad over there, and that had honestly terrified her. But, after hearing about what had happened to Steve, she felt sick to her stomach. What if something had happened to Bucky too? What if he had suffered a similar fate to his best friend? What if she never had the opportunity to really tell him how she felt about him? She was taken from her own thoughts when the doorbell rang. A feeling of dread set in once more as she pictured a soldier standing there, not the one that she hoped would be, holding a letter. One that would tell her the fate of Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes of the 107th. However, when she finally did reach the door, she'd almost been too afraid to answer it, the wind sort of felt like it had been knocked out of her. Standing right there in front of her was the man who had been plaguing her thoughts for so long now. She'd been terrified, thinking that she'd lost him, but she hadn't. Because Bucky was standing right there. "Oh my God..." She breathed, her arms instinctively looping around his neck as she nearly threw herself at him.

---

Peter was honestly just working off of a routine now. He would go to class every day, do his homework, and then call it a night. Occasionally, he'd get some work done at the coffee shop on campus, though that was usually only on the days that he had a break between classes. He'd been lucky enough to get a schedule with little to no breaks between classes, so there wasn't much time to kill, only on Wednesday afternoons did he actually have to figure something out. And that's why he found himself seated at a table in the corner of the small coffee shop by the window. He'd just finished typing up a proposal for a research paper in his Statistics class. Yeah, he actually had to write a paper for a math class. It was kind of pointless in his opinion, however it didn't seem like a very challenging assignment. If anything, it was just a tedious one.

[No worries, hun ]

After getting her coffee, Lux glanced around the coffee shop to try to find a place to sit down. She spotted a boy from her Literature class, Peter, she thought was his name. With a nervous little smile, because he always seemed a little distant, she walked over to his table. "Hi, um, you're in my Literature class, right? Peter? I was just wondering if I could sit. I'm Lux," she asked him. He seemed nice enough, a quiet boy, seemed a little depressed, but maybe that was school as it was really stressful. "You can totally tell me to leave, I completely understand, yunno the whole "stranger danger" thing."

Bucky was terrified. What if she didn't love him anymore? He wouldn't have anyone then. Nightmares about Steve kept him up at night, now would thoughts of Felicity keep is mind occupied all day? Would that be how he would live? She opened the door after a few minutes and engulfed him in a hug after seeing that it really was him. "Felicity," he breathed, arms wrapping around her tightly after a moment, not wanting to let go. "Oh, Felicity." He didn't want to let go, never let go and he couldn't lose her, right? That's how it went. "I'm back. I'm here. And I'm not leaving, not again."

Felicity was at a loss for words. She couldn't believe that it was him, that Bucky really was there, and that he was okay. After not receiving any new letters from him, she couldn't help expecting the worst. It was far too easy to expect the worst when she heard what was going on over there. But he was safe. He was home, and she was never letting him leave ever again. "I was so worried." She said, her voice cracking slightly as she spoke. "I thought I'd lost you." She pulled back slightly to look at him, reaching her hand up to touch his face lightly. "I can't believe you're really here."

---

Peter had a tendency to keep to himself. If he kept to himself, he wouldn't form any close relationships with anyone, and if he didn't form any close relationships with anyone, he couldn't lose them. That was his logic behind his all. He was afraid of losing someone again, so he kept to himself. It was the best method that he could come up with. However, it appeared as though someone had other plans for him. He looked up, somewhat surprised that anyone had actually approached him. He figured that no one would with approach him with how standoffish he was, but that clearly wasn't the case. "Uh, yeah, sure. Go for it." He said, punctuating his words with a shrug of his shoulders. He couldn't be rude to her. That wouldn't be right.

"Thanks," Lux chirped, sitting herself down across from him. In classes, he seemed like a really loner-ish kind of guy, not much for conversation. He was just there for classes and that was that. Lux had figured that he had some amazing life outside of class that he didn't have to make friends or anything in the room. But now seeing him outside of campus, he seemed sad. "So, uh, I've seen you around campus and obviously in Lit and all. Do you like it there? What's your major?" Lux had to stop herself from asking too many questions. That's what she did: ask. She probably would've done well as a philosophy major. She took a sip from her coffee, the hot liquid not phasing her. Coffee was her favourite, something she could very well live off of if she tried.

Bucky could feel her. He could feel her skin, her hair, her lips on his. Everything. It all felt real and that was how he had decided that this wasn't a dream. That this was reality and it was good to him for once. "I'm sorry," was all he could muster then, the sound of a breath. He dipped his head down to place a kiss on her forehead. He was doing anything he could to touch her: keeping his hands on her waist, a kiss on her forehead, anything and everything. He was scared that if he let go that he would realise that this really was a dream and she would fade away and he would be back at war again.

Felicity had started to lose hope. She had started to think that she was right, that, like many of the other soldiers, Bucky had perished during the war. Until now. Because he was here right now. He was alive, and he was there with her right now. This wasn't just a dream that she could wake up from any second now. This was reality, and she planned on clinging to it for as long as she possibly could. Feeling his lips on her forehead, she let out a shaky breath, her eyes drifting closed for a few moments. "It's alright." She said quietly. "You're here right now, and that's all that I care about."

---

Peter nodded wordlessly. Just because she was sitting with him, didn't mean that he had to converse with her. Of course, that possibility seemed very unlikely when she started asking him questions. She wanted to get to know him, and before everything, he probably wouldn't have minded that. But getting to know someone meant forming possibly forming actual relationships with them, and that was something that Peter had hoped to avoid. He wasn't sure if that was possible anymore though. "It's alright, I guess." He said, shrugging his shoulders. "Photography." Maybe if he kept his answers short, things could work in his favor.

@ anchors aweigh.
[Hey, are you still up for this? ]