Retrograde▸bucky barnes

3. Coffee Shop Girl

Another week in New York, another set of croissants on Saturday morning and a second cup of coffee in the best local coffee shop. This time Lena did not run into anyone, let alone see the hot chocolate man which she found curiously disappointing.

She was working her way through the rest of Lord of the Rings and was finding them much more enjoyable in English. But that was not surprising considering German translations somewhat disrupted the aesthetics of Tolkien's naming vernacular.

"Do you mind if I join you, everywhere else is full," a familiar voice said.

Lena looked up to meet the eyes of the hot chocolate man.

"Of course. Can I still call you Bucky?" she said, removing her feet from the chair opposite her. He slid onto the chair with ease, gloved hands setting down his steaming drink.

"Only if you're still going by Lena."

"That is my name."

"Hot chocolate again?"

He smiled sheepishly, "I haven't found anywhere that makes coffee the same way as the one in my hometown used to."

"And where is home?"

"Brooklynn."

Lena raised an eyebrow, "We're practically in Brooklyn."

Bucky shook his head, "I mean that that coffee shop no longer exists,"

"Oh, sorry about that, I certainly would be sad if this place didn't exist. I'm kinda emotionally attached ya know?"

"Right? When I was a kid, a teenager, my mom would take me to my favorite one once a month and buy me coffee to get me to tell her about my life. Because a caffeine high was the only way she could get me talking," he said like he was looking very far back into the past.

Lena smiled inwardly, finding the story overly endearing and reminding her of her own childhood, "My mother would always do Sunday mornings with hot chocolate and a tiny drip of coffee into my cup as a child, just enough for me to think I was receiving something special."

Bucky smiled before nodding to Lena's book "You still reading Tolkien?"

Lena grinned, "You remembered?"

"Nobody forgets Tolkien."

"Yes, on to Mordor now," Lena smiled as he took a sip of his drink, leaving a line of whipped cream on his lip, "You've got a bit of ah, something on your lip there-"

He wagged his tongue at her like a child before licking the cream away, causing her to laugh more.

"Is this your normal Saturday routine then, croissants and coffee?"

"Yes, it will be, I think. I'm only recently back in New York- I was in other places before. And then you know, the Blip-"

"You were gone too?" he said, eyebrows lifting in surprise.

"Yes. Kind of feels weird to be back and everyone else having gone on with their lives, but I'm used to it by now."

Bucky smiled like he was thinking about something else, "To be back to real life after the world moved on without us?"

"Exactly. And you? New York raised?" Lena asked.

"I grew up here," he said, "but I've been gone a long time. It barely resembles the place I remember. I guess time is supposed to pass like that."

"It's just always a shame when you aren't there to experience the change, like all the things I loved about a place disappeared. I'm just as much a stranger to the place as it is to me."