The Back Porch

The new Avengers facility had a cafeteria along the back, with a patio full of tables that had umbrellas to provide shade for the diners. Patrons could look out across the meadow, where trainees skirmished, toward the woods.

During the day, the cafe was bustling, full of SHIELD agents and the unspecified paramilitary forces, who trained alongside the Avengers.

But after hours, those people went back to their homes or their barracks, leaving the patio to the Avengers. The Avengers rarely sat at the tables, umbrellas now furled. They sat on the side of the planter or on the wide steps leading down to the meadow.

Steve Rogers called it the back porch, remembering his mother and Bucky's mother sitting on the front porch while sewing and shelling peas and peeling potatoes.

The Avengers retreated to the back porch when they sought solitude, finding solace, gazing across the calm field toward the peaceful woods, with only the rustling leaves to keep them company.

And sometimes teammates shared the peace and quiet, and the solitude.