Dating Game ☆ Bucky x Reader

Chapter 2

Your apartment is on the small side, though you could likely afford better. The pharmaceutical company that you work for pays well enough even though you only man the phones and buzz people through the door. Your small one-room studio in an out of the way run-down building on the edge of East Village is home and you wouldn't change it for the world.

The sun was going down and was painfully bright streaming through the one window on the far side of the room. You wander over and pull your heavy maroon curtains closed even though they don't really help all that much with the sun at this angle. You glance around and realize that you absolutely must find time to pick the place up. It's starting to get cluttered. Even your bed up the stairs in the loft is unmade and a mess with books, your laptop, and, okay, maybe a bag of chips strewn across it in some mild objection to your need to be organized.

Across from the window is a rather small kitchen with an island separating it from the rest of the room. Red appliances that almost match your curtains, black countertops, and slightly more chrome than you would like make up the rest of the contents. Grabbing a slice of pizza from the fridge that you had leftover from the night before, you flop down onto your couch. You grab the remote to mindlessly flip through channels before inevitably pulling up a streaming service to rewatch something you'd seen a hundred times. You are a creature of habit and your routine rarely changes. Before you have the chance to flip through more than just a few channels your phone buzzes.

<<Hey! I have a question. When do you think you will be off work next? Saturday, right? - N>>

You look at your phone with a slight tilt to your head. You gave Natalie your phone number a few weeks back after she didn't make your morning ritual coffee so she could text or call if she needed it because you might have panicked a little. Momma bears always worry. What was curious though was that she was in fact correct about your day off. Your schedule shifts without warning sometimes and is hard to keep track of. You brush it off as simply a lucky guess since most people are off weekends. You message her back almost immediately since she texts you so infrequently.

<<You rarely text me, is it a problem? Do I need to take a day for something? Friend punch the wrong person for looking at him sideways and need a ride home from county lockup?>>

You are mostly joking but there was some underlying shimmer of danger about him. Even someone oblivious to body language could pick that up. You wouldn't be shocked if he's the barfight type. In fact, you are ninety-nine percent sure he's the barfight type.

<<Nothing like that. I'm going to be pretty busy for the next couple of weeks. You mind going to dinner or something and keeping him company some on Saturday so he's not alone? -N>>

She wants me to do what? She wants me to babysit this pile of doom and gloom and sarcasm! Almost immediately after... your phone pings again.

<<I know what you're thinking. He really is usually more pleasant than he was this morning. I promise. I will do all the work, you just have to show up. Please? Consider it a favor and I owe you one. I'll even drop you off some clothes. It's a themed dinner! - N>>

You let out a loud groan that devolves into a heavy sigh. Your hands find their way up to rub your temples. This stinks of a set up. It really does.

<<Natalie..... >>

<<I will buy your coffee for the next month. Please? -N>>

<<Oh for fucks sake. Fine. Message me with the details later.>>

<<Thank you! Thank you! I'll bring clothes at some point before Saturday and help you pick something! Have a nice night! - N>>

You sit your cellphone on the couch beside you wondering exactly what you got yourself into. Dinner? With that grouchy, anti-social bastard from this morning? A themed costume dinner with that grouchy antisocial bastard from this morning? Well this is going to be an adventure that you are absolutely sure you probably won't enjoy as much as your friend thinks you will.