brushpass | threads

He warps his arm around her shoulder letting her lean in a little bit as they walk. They fit nice like this, and he's going to enjoy it. "Lucky for us we have all the time in the world anymore, and we're in France," he says fondly. She'd done a good job with this, like a really good job with it all.

"I'd like to see you with blue hair sometime, I can't imagine you with it at all, did you like that as a kid?" he chuckles softly. "Maybe when we get back to the States we can take a road trip sometime. Ohio isn't all that far from Indiana you know..." which is a stupid thing to say in hindsight, so he bites the corner of his lip a bit realizing it was a dumb suggestion.

Her arm loops around his waist in turn as his arm settles around her shoulders and she lets her hand run over his side with a smile when he says they have all the time in the world. It's a charming rarity, to have time. To not have to rush through everything. Neither of them are the type to ever stop looking over their shoulders, but she'll take time.

"I liked how it was rebellious, you know? You want me to be the perfect daughter, well now I've got blue hair and I'm cruising around the neighborhood on a bike and skinning my knees learning to skateboard. I've got a picture I can show you." Melina has the photo album, but she at least has that photo strip of her and Yelena. Her head turns and she looks at him with a fond smile. "We can go to Ohio. But if you're trying to meet my family, we'll have to go somewhere else."

He makes a note to ask more about her family in specific when they're back in the privacy of their safe house. He doesn't want to risk what they have going here, even if it feels pretty safe, he doesn't want to have to run again right away.

They wander into the center of town and find a patisserie where Bucky keeps an arm around her and orders an espresso and a croissant and then tells the counter person, "and whatever my beautiful girlfriend wants," before he pays for whatever Nat has before using the wallet that Nat had given him. Sure it was a little off, but it feels nice to be taking care of her even in the smallest of ways that he could.

They take the food outside to a bench in the sun so they can eat and enjoy the French morning. He's quite, not pensive, but just enjoying the beauty of the city, the sun on his face.

"They say Paris is for lovers but I'm starting to feel like all of France is," he says softly after taking a drink of his coffee. "How do Frenchmen not fall in love with every pretty girl they meet in a town like this?"

The patisserie is small but bustling, and Natasha orders a pain au chocolat and an espresso of her own. She drops a kiss on his jaw after he pays. It's a nice morning. She likes the look of the sun, the way people are milling around and enjoying each other's company. Being able to preserve these moments for people is one of the reasons why she's stayed in the field as long as she has. But it's nice, to have some quiet every once in a while.

"Have you never met a Frenchman?" she quips as she looks over at him with a smirk. "I'm pretty sure they do."

He thinks about saying something about that he has, during the war but it would be out of his cover and wrong to do so he just smiles over at her. "My first job out of school, worked with a couple, they were womanizers..." he teases, but of course it was the war and who wasn't at the time. Any time they got leave it was go looking for the ladies of course, and drinks.

"I'm sure they do very well but I like girls from Ohio," he says and sets his croissant down on his lap so he can wrap an arm around her shoulder and still hold on to his espresso. These moments are easy, and they seem to come more naturally as he does each one. It's like it's as easy as climbing a flight of stairs. "Climbing up that tree and crawling into the window in your parents two story..." he says with a happy sigh as he unlocks another memory, simply changing out the details but referencing the window climbing. Sure it'd been scaling a brick wall at the red room with nothing to climb but same thing right?

Natasha's been in the game long enough that she can read between the lines. Moreover, she's finding that she still knows him well enough to tell when he's telling a piece of the truth behind the cover. It's a nice balance. There's a hint of a smirk at the corner of her mouth when he mentions that the Frenchmen he knew were womanizers. "Oh, I'm sure they were the only ones," she teases.

She leans easily into him as his arm drapes around her shoulders, taking a bite from her pastry as she listens to him. She can't help but laugh a little, tipping her head to look over at him when it becomes apparent that he's uncovered a memory. "All that sneaking around," she reminisces. "Having you show up at my window at night was the only good part of having to live in Ohio."

"You are not seriously accusing me of being an womanizer myself are you?" He asks with a chuckle leaning on to kiss her the top of her head fondly. "Well, we do have the real source to go to for that so I suppose we can get an independent judgement sometime from him." He's fairly certain that Steve will absolutely say he was way too much, but he might be able to get to him first and suggest he play wingman for him if they avoid that conversation for long enough.

"You were the only good thing about Ohio too..." he adds softly as he sinks into the memories itself. He's quite, focusing on the memories as he sips his espresso and keeps the arm around her gently. No matter how easy some of this is, with her guidance, sometimes he shifts a rock, and finds a painful spot in his brain. When those happens he shuts down a little further, just like that.

"Less accusing, more observing," Natasha corrects with a fond smile. She tips her head toward him as he kisses her hair, and then shifts so she can lean her head on his shoulder. The silence lingers, and then lingers long enough that she can tell he's chasing a thread through his mind. She links her hand with his, giving it a squeeze. "Penny for your thoughts."

Her voice shakes him out of it, shaking his head a little bit as though he's trying to clear the thought from his head. "Just, bad memories, I can tell you about them when we're back if you really wanna know.." he says before taking a sip of his coffee.

As if it's that simple to push the bad memories away, they're still creeping there, hiding out in the corner but he tries to push them away. "What do you do when you can get them out of your brain? or stop thinking about them?" he asks curiously.

"I wanna know anything you want to share," Natasha answers. He's got several decades worth of bad memories and trauma to process. And there's no blueprint for how to go about it. All he can do is feel through what's right for him and all she can do is give him a safe place to crash land.

She hums thoughtfully as she mulls over his question. "Something active. Drinking, sparring, darts." Her elbow nudges his side playfully. "Making out like teenagers."

"Maybe we'll make out tonight then, or go dancing, depending on what we feel like later," he suggests squeezing her hand. He could use to get his mind out of the mess that it was in, thoughts of being tortured filling it all because of a failed mission that he'd committed.

They'd never failed together. It was the only one he'd ever properly failed, when he had killed his target, but not his handler in Odessa. When he'd let Natasha live, the flashes in his brain about it all were still a jumbled mess, and he very well could not fight them off here in the city so he tries to burry them deeper.

"Did someone teach you how to play darts somewhere, or did you just happen to pick it up sometime?" He asks curiously, "How about billiards?"

"Get some music going in the living room and we can have the best of both worlds," Natasha answers with a smile. She can tell there's a little bit of 'fake it until you make it' going on behind his answers. But she trusts him to let her know if it's too overwhelming. She can fake a plausible reason for them to get up and make a quick exit at any time.

She shifts so her shoulder is leaning against his as she answers him. "My best friend has really great aim," she tells him, obviously referring to Clint. "And I'm really competitive. It was one of the things we used to do when we were getting to know each other. Billiards I like too. I promise I won't hustle you."

"I dunno, if you get me dancing you might get a little too distracted by how good my body moves, darlin'" it's light and teasing, and clearly still a fake it until you make it moment but he's leaning into it. Hell, maybe the idea of teasing his not-girlfriend about being too turned on and wanting to have sex with him is just the kind of teasing he needs to break the stupid out of his brain.

"I guess I'll just try to avoid getting hustled from you then, damn, I'm going to have to come up with some really out of date game or something to take you on hm?" he jokes as he starts to think about it. "Parcheesi or something like that."

"I'm always distracted by how good your body moves." Natasha flirts back with him easily, keeping the banter playful. It's something to focus on that's not introspective, a pattern break to hopefully give him some relief until they can get back to the apartment. She makes a mental note to ask him if there's anything else he wants to be doing as he works through the mess that's been left behind in his mind.

She hums thoughtfully as she takes a bite of her pastry. "I can't say I've played much parcheesi. You'll have to remind me of the rules. How about gin?"

“We might have to make it strip gin rummy then,” he teases, “If you’re so confident in your gin skills. Hell, we could also pick up a bottle of gin to go with it if we really want to make it a night.”

Still making the effort to distract himself he swipes some powdered sugar from the bag and puts a dollop of it on Natasha’s nose fondly. “Oh no, I guess I’ll have to clean that up now too,” he says and gives her nose a playful quick peck with his lips.

"Gin and gin?" she suggests with a grin. "Sounds like a good night to me. I'm sure the French will excuse us not drinking wine for gin and gin." She'll look up where they can buy alcohol and some food before they head back. Her contacts stocked the kitchen for them but there's nothing like being able to pick out some things to try for yourself.

She makes a face at him, wrinkling her nose playfully when he swipes the sugar on it. Since he's nice enough to clean it up, she returns the favor by tipping her head to kiss his jaw as he leans back. "You sure you didn't miss anything?"

"I'm sure we can find some excuse to go drink wine one the many other nights we're here," he says settling in to let her kiss his jaw. It feels nice, familiar in a way that a lot of other things don't. Safe.

"I think we might be good, but I can always do a second once over..." he sighs contently at that before leaning back to capture her lips in a long, soft kiss that's easy to fall into. When he pulls back he sighs happily. "Okay, now I think you're safe, darling."

"I appreciate your rigorous dedication to safety standards," Natasha answers with a grin after he leans back. Reaching up, she brushes the pad of her thumb lightly along his cheekbone. "Want to have a look around that little grocer's we walked by? Pick out some things you might like to try eating."

"Yeah let's go," he says moving to get up and taking her hand again to walk. "I want you to pick up some of your favorites too that you think I should try -- you know I hate making decisions," he gives her a smile as if to try to say and that's okay right?.

"I'll pick a few, you pick a few." She makes the agreement easily, taking a last sip of her coffee before tossing her trash in a nearby bin. Her hand twines with his as they walk. The good thing about going to a little local grocer's is that there will be considerably less to pick between than if they wandered into a supermarket.

Natasha passes a hand basket over to him to carry with a grin as they turn into the store. "You know what might be fun? We can make a charcuterie board. Then you can try things without having to commit to eating a lot of it if you end up not liking it."

"I mean, I feel like anything is probably better then what I was eating all those years.." he makes a face at her memory. The bullshit ration bars that were supposed to be optimum nutrients but left little more to taste then chewing on cardboard. Not that he'd ever actually do that.

He gives her hand a squeeze as they walk, this part is easy though. "I absolutely want some raspberries though. Used to sneak them all summer at home."

"You're not wrong there," she agreed. The widows had a standard of perfection they were expected to maintain. That, and she was pretty sure the luxury of a good meal on a mission was part of the bait Dreykov kept on his lure. As they made their way down along the refrigerated cases, she idly dropped a few different cheeses into the basket as she listened to him talk.

"Oh yeah? Were you growing them on the porch, or were they wild somewhere?" They'd come up to the fruit by that point, and her eyes skimmed the cartons before she let go of his hand and popped the lid on one. She extracted a raspberry and held it up for him to try with a grin. "Go on."

"Dad used to bring them back from his cousin's upstate a lot, and I would eat them before mom ever had a chance to use them." He says with a chuckle. He let's her pick things up while looking at stuff curiously.

When they get to the fruit aisle though he leans in and takes the raspberry from her, kissing her fingers with a grin. "Taste just like I remember." And then proceeds to load up on all sorts of different fruit, a peach, persimmons, a pomegranate.

"Do you have any favorites?"

Natasha smiles to herself as she listens to him talk, casually adding items to the hand basket. It's nice to hear his memories when they come back like this - just little things that shaped his life before slipping easily through the cracks. She winks at him when he kisses her fingertips.

"Blueberries. And cherries. My sister and I used to eat them out in the back yard and compete to see who could spit the pit the farthest." She sounds amused as she shares the story, like she's well aware of how hideously unladylike it was. Which was entirely the point of doing it.

"Grab some, I'm not afraid to take you on girl," he'd tease and lean over to give her cheek a kiss. Honestly, Natasha is ladylike but that's not what attracts him to her. At this point he's pretty sure of that anyways.

"I feel like the army might have prepared me for some real spintin' contests though," he says with a grin. In truth he doesn't know why he likes her, other then he does and his memories tell him that -- but each story she tells him is even more endearing and he can't help but smile when she tells them.

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