Abandoned- {Pietro Maximoff}

Before- Chapter 3

"Why are you so horny, man?"

"Because my girlfriend is incredibly beautiful. And don't call me man when I'm trying to seduce you."

"Seduce me better then," Pietro went to unzip her dress but Alex teleported away and held up her hand, "Another time. Family dinner, remember."

"Unfortunately. I'm sure they wouldn't care if you were late."

"They would all know why I'm late though, and I would have to deal with that conversation on my own which I'm not at all willing to do. It was bad enough when they pulled straws to see who would give me the talk and Thor had to do it, only for Sam to also give me one when I told him I liked girls."

"Isn't Sam gay?"

"Yeah. And yet his talk was better than Thor's."

Pietro began to laugh and Alex examined him in the mirror, trying to keep the smile off her face as she applied lipstick. The colour was deep plum, chosen to compliment the dress and while she had originally loved it, she was now unsure if it was too much. If she would be too much.

"You look incredible," said Pietro in a low voice, no doubt noticing the way her face had fallen, "It'll be alright, you know it will be."

"The last time I saw them all together, it was after London. I had Natasha's literal blood on my hands and so many others' too. Plus, there's a 'special guest'," Alex did the quotation marks, mocking it, "Hoping it will be Thor but I don't know."

"They would have told you if it was."

"I like to think so. I really miss him. He wasn't close family like Steve and Clint are, but he's still family. Still my Nonnino."

She lingered for a moment, staring vaguely forward as sadness began to settle over her. Pietro coughed, perfectly in sync with the clock as it began to chime seven. Drawing her eyes up to him, Pietro grinned,

"Am I your Papino yet?"

"Fuck you," Alex said with a laugh that helped clear away thoughts of Thor, "I'm going."

Rather than teleporting to the dining room in the Avengers compound, Alex went to the front door and knocked on it.

The few minutes it took for someone to open the door made Alex feel even more relaxed, resting her fingers on her pulse as she forced it to even out. Eventually, the door was opened, by a girl who looked not that much older than Alex.

Alex had opened her mouth already, prepared to greet whoever answered but she wasn't expecting this. The girl's face was made up of scars, and they also traced down her neck. Patches of her skin were different colours, the skin beneath her eyes seemed to droop, as though being pulled down by an invisible hook. What looked like the metal of Tony's suits was embedded in parts of her skin, notably tiny red shrapnel across her chin and right cheek, and a thin golden line running across the bump of her nose.

She could have been a magazine-worthy beauty once, Alex could tell from the shine of her dark-blond hair and easy smile, and she was still beautiful now, in a way that you noticed as long as you kept looking after the first glance.

"Hi," the girl said with a smile that reminded Alex of Tony's fake-one. She leant against the door casually, dark blond hair tied up with a few strands falling purposely in her face, "Alex."

"Alessandra. Who are you?"

"Chesney," she lingered on the name and Alex got a feeling that she wasn't saying something,

"What are you doing here?"

"I'm with the Avengers."

Neither girl moved for a moment, then Chesney inclined her head slightly and moved back so Alex could walk inside. They began walking together, every second step Chesney took being marked by a slight clinking noise, and Alex deliberately slowed so she could examine the back of her. They walked in silence, and as they made it to a set of double doors through which Alex could see a dining table, Alex felt like she had passed some sort of test.