Notes: I'm slow, and late, and I'm sorry. Enjoy!

Wish Upon a Star

Chapter 4: Baby Steps

Darcy slumped back on the couch rubbing over her very full stomach. "God, why did you guys let me eat that much?" she groaned. The lights were low, and she could feel the men on either side of her like a brand against her skin. She could hear the jet engine crashing down on the screen, but she wasn't watching. Clint and Bucky's hands linked on the back of the couch over her head like a forbidden warmth along the top of her head, and she resisted the urge to lean back into them. She had to keep reminding herself that she didn't really know them, even if they felt so familiar.

Both men had been extremely respectful of her space the entire night, offering her the overstuffed chair next to the couch, not scooting too close when she sat down in the center of the couch when it was obvious that they really wanted her to sit close. Even if they wouldn't say it, their warm smiles had said everything. Neither of them had touched so much as her hand without asking first, which was both wonderfully considerate, and created a frustratingly artificial distance between them all.

"I don't recall force feeding you, doll," Bucky chuckled softly, it was a little dry and tired, not like the full throated laughter from the videos on her phone, but it made her smile all the same. Over the course of the movie, he had slowly relaxed, leaning against the back of the couch, with one arm behind her, his fingers threaded through his boyfriends, while she curled up, her feet tucked under herself between them. "You were the one who stole that last dumpling right of our poor Hawk's plate."

"Yeah, he really looks like he's starving," she rolled her eyes and poked the man in question with the toe of her bear slippers. Clint had fallen asleep halfway through the flim, and was slowly slumping over until his head rested on the arm across the back of the couch, his warm breath ghosting over Darcy's cheek, just far enough away not to touch. "You want me to go so you can put him to bed?"

"He can survive a night on the couch," Bucky shrugged, carefully pulling his hand from Clint's and standing to stretch. The hem of his t-shirt climbed up over the sculpted planes of his stomach as he arched his arms over his head. Darcy followed the sliver of bare skin for a moment before she heard him huff out a laugh.

"I'm sorry," she looked away and scooted to the edge of the couch, grabbing for her plate. She could feel her cheeks burning.

"Nothing to be sorry for, Darce," he caught her chin carefully with the tip of his metal index finger and tipped her head up. "Makes me feel good when you look at me like that."

"It's just," she shook him off and turned away, taking her trash to the kitchen. "I don't," she dumped her plate into the garbage and leaned back against the counter, carding her fingers through her hair. "I haven't earned it, I barely know you, I shouldn't take advantage."

Bucky leaned on the other side of the counter, letting the marble expanse sit between them, cold and unyielding. "When I first came here, I lived in this cell down in one of the sub basements," he blew out a long breath, and looked down at the counter, his finger swirling over a flourish on the surface. "Not because anyone else thought I should be locked up, but because I was scared of what I might do." He sat down on one of the breakfast stools and rubbed his forehead. "I wasn't really me yet," he shrugged, his fingers scratching at the stubble plus on his chin. "I was broken into pieces spread over decades, I couldn't remember half of what I had done or had been done to me, but the nightmares where enough to keep me down there," he looked up at Darcy through the curtain of his dark hair, a pained smile pulling at one corner of his lips. "Steve came down every day, talked to me, tried to convince me to come out, reminisce, you know, was basically just Steve. One day, I guess I had been there for a few weeks, it's all kinda a blur for me, he brought this spunky brunette with him. A girl right out of Bucky Barne's pin up fantasies. Girl had curves for days," his grimace turned into a teasing lear, making Darcy blush and look away under the intensity of his stare. "And you were wearing this dark blue dress, tiny little waist, breasts pressing enticingly against the conservative boat neck. You were talking poor Steve's ear off about spending all of his time brooding down in the basement."

"Sounds like me," she said quietly.

"I took one look at you and said, 'baby doll, what you wasting your time trying to talk to a brick wall like this punk?' You looked right at me and pushed Steve back into the elevator, saying that you had it from there. And Steve went. You turned back to me and leaned over the back of the chair Steve usually sat in and looked me straight in the eye. You said, 'Sweetheart, you want any chance at all this,' and honest to god you ran your hands down the front of your dress and over your hips while you licked your lips," he shook his head and leaned back. "I was done for right then, just in case you're wondering. But you circled the chair and sat down, picked up a hardbound book and folded your hands in your lap and said 'then you are just going to have to come out of that cage you've put yourself in, and come get it. And until then, I'm going to tell you a story about a boy named Harry.' You read Harry Potter to me for a full week before you brought Clint down."

"Why are you telling me this?" Darcy's throat was tight just thinking about the man she had just started to get to know putting himself in self imposed prison.

"You earned any look you want to give me," Bucky watched the back of her head, where it hung down between her shoulders. "You might not remember, and that's okay."

"It's really not," she interrupted, pushing off the counter to turn and look at him. "I wish I remembered all of that."

"Maybe you will, maybe you won't," he shrugged. "But we can start again, yeah?"

"Yeah," she swallowed thickly, surprised by how much she wanted to just that. She wanted to earn her place in Bucky's life, in Clint's. It almost hurt how much she wished she could remember just one thing about their life together.

"Good," he nodded. "Now, how about we make Clint a little more comfortable and put Labyrinth on?"

"I'm not keeping you up?" Darcy pushed her hair off her face and pulled it up into a ponytail.

"Don't sleep much," Bucky wiggled his fingers out to her, and sighed when she took his hand. "Plus, I kinda just want to spend some time with you, that okay doll?"

"Well, it is my favorite movie," she smiled as he pulled her around the couch and pushed her back into her stop in the middle of the couch. Bucky carefully maneuvered Clint around so he was leaning on the far arm. The blond grumbled a little in his sleep, but settled again when Bucky brushed a kiss across his brow.

Darcy watched as Bucky changed the disc, then settled to her right. "Thank you for giving us a chance," he said as he started the movie, kissing her cheek, his beard scratching against her skin.

Darcy woke with a start when her phone started ringing, taking a moment to figure out where she was. The room was dark, the TV having long since gone to sleep, but there was a sense of warmth and comfort, even if she had slept in an awkward position on the imposing leather couch. She tried to roll off the couch, but was crushed between Clint and Bucky. The latter had his metal arm draped over her shoulders, holding her tightly to his chest, while his legs caged her in, his thick thighs clinging around her hips like even in sleep he was scared that she would run. Clint was sound asleep, face first in her stomach, hands tangled in the fabric of her t-shirt. At some point in the night her shirt had ridden up, and his warm breath bathed her skin, leaving a moist trail of drool down her side. He lay sprawled out on his stomach between her and Bucky's legs, completely dead to the world, and dead weight against her body.

"Bucky," she poked at the arm around her shoulders, not really knowing how sensitive the metal appendage was, and tried to sit up, but the man behind her just tightened his hold with a groan, his other arm came up to hold her still, his bearded chin rubbing into the tangled mass of her hair.

"Clint," she tried again, poking at the blond who was keeping her captive with his body weight. But like his partner, he only rubbed his face into the soft flesh of her stomach, his nose catching on her belly button. He let out a groan so sinful that if she could, she would have fidgeted between them.

She huffed out along breath and looked at her phone dancing on the coffee table, and tried to pull the arms around her shoulders off of her, which only caused Bucky to tangle his fingers in her hair and pull her closer. "Jane's calling, there must be a fire in the lab!"

Both men sprang into action, pulling her off the couch and upright in a flurry of moment, while somehow keeping all three of them from toppling over the coffee table.

"I'll call Thor," Clint jumped over the back of the couch, and ran towards his phone.

"I'll get your shoes," Bucky was off towards the bedroom before Darcy could blink. "Jarvis, activate code bad science."

Darcy picked up her own buzzing phone and answered. "Hey Janie," she pushed her t-shirt down and rubbing the slightly damp patch of skin on her belly where Clint had been drooling. "Sorry I didn't check in, I must have fallen asleep watching Labyrinth." She turned around to a throat behind her being cleared, and blushed full on at the two men watching her with their hands on their hips. Bucky even had her Doc Martin's dangling from his fingers as they glared at her. She shrugged and put her hand over the receiver on her phone. "What, you were squishing me, and the phone was ringing, what was I supposed to do?"

Clint rolled his eyes and trudged into the kitchen, flicking on the coffee machine.

"You slept with them?!" Darcy winced at Jane's happy squeal.

"No," she rolled her eyes and followed the men into the kitchen, accepting an empty mug from Bucky. "Well, yes, but not in the way you mean. We fell asleep on the couch."

"And you got squished between them? Sounds like someone had fun last night," Jane continued. "Anyway, I don't mean to interrupt, cause you totally deserve to have some sexy time with your boys, so I will go to the lab, and you come in when you're done."

"No sexy times, we watched Donny Darko and Labyrinth," Darcy held out her cup to Clint who filled it.

"Aww, I missed Jareth?" the archer pouted. "But you know…" he looked at Darcy who raised a brow, his face fell at her questioning look, and she wanted to kick herself. Two days before she wouldn't have cared that she upset him, but after just one night hanging out, she felt like a total bitch for putting that look on his face. "Bucky knows how much I love that movie," he finished hastily, turning to rummage in the fridge for breakfast.

"Next time, Hawk," Bucky pulled him close and pressed a kiss to Clint's lips and stool the coffee carafe from where he was pushing it into the refrigerator. "Morning, Darce," he dropped a gentle, slightly hesitant kiss on her temple.

"Morning, Bucky," she gave him a soft smile and slid out of the kitchen with her cup and sat down on one of the kitchen stools, feeling far more comfortable in the apartment then she thought she had any right to. "I'll be down in a little bit," she said to Jane, looking up at the two men who were dancing around each other in the kitchen, getting breakfast things together. "Just let me shower and change."

"Are you sure?" Jane asked from her end of the phone, the tell tale crinkle of a poptart package rustling under her words.

"Yes, I'm sure," Darcy rolled her eyes and took a careful sip of the hot coffee. "And you better eat something other than pop tarts before I get down there."

"I had some nice beef sausage about half an hour ago," Jane said sweetly, the satisfied purr in her voice barely covered under her saccharine tone. "Does that count."

"Oh god, Jane!" she pulled the phone away from her ear and looked at it. "I did not need to know that, gross." She jammed the end button.

"Showers all yours if you want it, doll," Bucky sat down on her left and took a long drink of the coffee in his hand, trying to hide the blush on his cheeks. "You got plenty of clothes here too."

"You can hear both sides of my conversation can't you?" she peeked over at the dark haired man, her tangled curls falling over her face.

"You mean one you where having with Jane about how she was dining on Thor's dick for breakfast?" he asked into the interior of his cup. "Yep."

"I'm glad I'm not the only one disturbed," she mumbled, accepting the yogurt and cereal concoction she preferred for breakfast from the blond haired man who was watching her from the kitchen.

"Hey Darce," Clint raised a cautious brow and leaned on the counter across from her, like he was trying to gauge her mood. "You know, we have a guest room," he shrugged and looked away, having a silent conversation with Bucky that she couldn't interpret. "You know, if you want, you don't have to stay with Jane."

"Um," she looked down into her own mug, swirling the small amount of black coffee that remained at the bottom of the cup.

"I mean, when you're ready, cause all your stuff is here, and so is Rusty," the blond shrugged. "He misses you, and so does Lucky."

"I don't know," Darcy took a deep breath and looked back and forth between the two men. "I just, I don't really know you two yet, and I would feel like I was imposing."

"No pressure, doll," Bucky stood and put his empty coffee cup in the sink. "But whenever you want to stay there, it's yours. This is your apartment."

"I'll think about it," she nodded and drank the last of her cooling coffee and picked up that spoon in her bowl. Clint had made her cereal just the way she liked it, the exact ratio of yogurt to Chex that she preferred. "One day at a time, okay?"
"Anything you want, babe," he pressed a kiss to the top of her head and headed for the bedroom. "You mind if I use the shower while you eat? I gotta meet Nat in like twenty."

"It's your shower," she waved a hand at him, and took a big bite of her breakfast. "You do what you need. Jane can wait," Darcy shuddered. "Especially after what she just told me." She tried to keep the mental image of Jane and Thor having shenanigans out of her head. "God, that's going to stay with me," she mumbled into her bowl.

"Yep," Bucky pulled the coffee carafe out of the machine and refilled her mug. "And I have a briefing with Point Break, Steve and Tony in like an hour," he leaned back against the counter watching her. "I know Clint's not going to ask, cause he's," he shrugged nodding his head back and forth. "Well, he's Clint and he sucks at this stuff. Don't get me wrong, once were all comfortable with each other again, he'll be fine, but the dating bit," Bucky rubbed his hand down his face. "If I had left it entirely to him the first time, I would probably still be living in Steve's guest room, and he would still be dancing awkwardly around us."

"He seems a little skittish," she agreed. "I figured it was just cause, you know, the whole other reality thing."

"Nope," Bucky shook his head. "He's our awkward Puppy."

"Right."

"So, anyway," he picked up Darcy's empty cereal bowl and put it in the sink. "He wants to ask you to go to the zoo with him tomorrow. It's something you two used to do all the time, you know when we were still kinda dating, dancing around this triad thing."

"Oh," she looked over at the open bedroom door and then back at the man in front of her. "Yeah, sure. I've always wanted to see the Central Park Zoo."

"Thanks, doll," he rounded the counter and pulled her into his arms carefully. She took a deep breath of the warm leather and metal scent of him, and it tugged at something in the back of her mind. She sank against his chest and curled her arms around his waist.

"Thank you for being so kind," Darcy had to keep herself from rubbing her face into the softness of his t-shirt, carefully pulling away from him. "I know this has to be so hard on you both."

"You both were patient with me," Bucky smiled down at her and she could see the sadness that lurked in the back of his expression. "It's just my turn now."

Notes: More love means faster writing, usually... as long as everything IRL does what its supposed to!