Ella didn't cross paths with Bucky for the rest of the week, she didn't walk past him in the corridor or spot him in the cafeteria. The only time she saw him was in lessons, but he always seemed to arrive last and leave first, so she didn't get a chance to speak to him. She hated to admit it but she had been looking out for him. On Friday she hung around by her locker after school in the hope he'd appear, but still nothing. She knew it was silly, she had Christian. She didn't know anything about him, save what few things Nat had told her, but she couldn't get him out of her mind. He'd taken up permanent residence.
She couldn't work out what it was. Yes, he was gorgeous enough for her jaw to hit the floor the first time she saw him, but it was more than that. She just wanted to get to know him, wanted to talk to him again.
She drove home, dropping Wanda off on the way. To her relief, the discussion focused on Nat's birthday, it yet again provided a welcome distraction. She should've had the usual Friday swim practice, but she didn't have any competitions coming up and she wasn't in the mood to be shouted at by the coach, she'd wait until next week to face his wrath. Instead, when she got in she went straight upstairs to change into her running clothes.
She pulled on a pair of black leggings and dug through her wash basket to find a sports bra. She made a mental note to do a wash when she got home. Once she'd found a pair of headphones and her trainers she checked the weather. It had been hot and humid all week but there were clouds overhead and it finally looked like the weather might break. She collected a jacket just in case the heavens decided to open while she was out.
She made her way back through the empty house and locked up behind her before standing on the drive and scrolling through her running playlist until she found the song she wanted. She made sure her phone was on silent and set off. She also wasn't in the mood to hear from Christian, how could she be when another boy was living rent-free in her head.
She was 20 minutes into her run when raindrops started to fall, she briefly considered turning home but within seconds it started to pour. She was soaked through before she could decide so she just carried on along her usual route. She ran through the outskirts of the town, the houses were sparse and separated by open green fields, which gave her a sense of freedom
She was on the home stretch when she finally looked at her phone. Four missed texts from Christian. She didn't need to read them to know he was trying to make plans for the evening. Friday was their night. He'd pick her up from swim practice and they'd go out. Food. A movie. Sometimes they'd just go on a drive.
She came to a stop and replied.
Out on a run. Need to clear my head. Raincheck?
He replied within seconds.
Okay, let me know if you need anything
She liked Christian. He was kind, thoughtful, and dependable. All the nice things. The idea of dating wasn't one she'd given much thought to, while all the girls were out trying to find boyfriends she just ignored it, she had too much going on in her life to spare the time or energy to date. But Christian had asked her to homecoming in freshman year, and she'd started dating him and just...never stopped. She didn't have to worry about him cheating, not spending enough time with him, or remembering things like their anniversary. So she went through the motions with him. Let him call her his girlfriend. Brought him home to meet her parents. And then before she knew it, it had been a year, and she realized she couldn't remember the last time he'd made her laugh. She wasn't sure he ever had.
She knew she probably shouldn't be with him. She didn't need thoughts of Bucky to make her realize that. But it was easy, comfortable, familiar, and she'd just kind of accepted that after almost two years she'd ride it out until college.
When she made it home the driveway was still empty, so she kept running. If she went in now she'd have the responsibility of cooking dinner, and the idea of that was almost enough to make her text Christian.
She ran until her lungs burned. It had been another half an hour, surely someone else would be home by now. The rain was still a steady drizzle but she was long past caring about how wet she was.
She made it home to see Sam's car parked up outside, next to one she didn't recognize. Maybe someone else got a new car over the summer.
When she opened the front door she was greeted by the familiar stench of chlorine and the sound of laughter.
She was on the way to the living room to say hi to whoever was round, headphones still in, when she collided with someone in the hall. The size of whoever it was made her think it was Steve, but when she looked up, she realized it was just the person she really wanted to see. Bucky. He was in her house. Wait. Why is he in my house?
"What are you..." she stuttered, pulling out her headphones.
"Oh hey Ella," Steve's voice came from behind her, "you missed practice?"
She turned to face her brother, his arms full of a crate of beer.
"Wasn't feeling it," she shrugged.
Steve gave her a worried look, so slight Bucky wouldn't notice, before he introduced the pair, oblivious to the fact they'd already met.
"Have you met Bucky? He just made the swim team."
"Oh! Congrats!" Ella exclaimed, trying not to appear as flustered as she felt.
"Yeah. Anyway, Sam's here too, going to have a few drinks and get to know the new guy if you want to join."
"Sure, I just need to..." she gestured vaguely at her soaking clothes.
"No worries, just hurry up if you want in on the pizza order," Steve warned.
Ella nodded and sidestepped Bucky to make her way upstairs, trying to get out of his sight so he wouldn't notice the blush rising in her cheeks. She grimaced when she made it into the bathroom. She was soaked through, her baby hairs were stuck to her forehead and she was pretty sure her trainers had actually squelched. Not the impression she wanted to make.
She was quick in the shower, going through the motions as she thought about the boy currently sitting in her living room. Their first conversation hadn't exactly gone well, but it was better than whatever had just happened downstairs. She was a flustered mess even though she'd spent days trying to talk to him again. Why do I care? I have Christian. Christian who was probably sitting at home worrying about her. Christian who she'd blown off in favor of what she had assumed would be a quiet night alone.
When she was done she threw on a sweatshirt and leggings and ran downstairs, she knew if Steve would order her something rubbish like Hawaiian if she didn't hurry.
When she got into the lounge she overheard Sam.
"Oh hell no! You cannot order her Hawaiian. Pineapple DOES NOT belong on pizza."
She grinned at Sam as she walked in. "Thanks for having my back."
"What are you having then?" Steve asked and she sat down next to him.
"Pepperoni, same as always, how hard is it to remember that?" She groaned as she grabbed herself a coke. She noticed Bucky's hands were empty so she passed a beer in his direction.
"Oh, no thanks. I'm good, I'm driving."
"Ridiculous," she laughed. "How are we going to get to know you if you're not drinking? I'm happy to give you a ride home."
She lifted the beer towards him again and he reached out slowly and took it.
"If you're sure?"
"Of course, I'm not drinking, I need to be up early."
He gave her a small smile and they both turned their attention back to Sam and Steve who were arguing over sides.
Finally, they made their decision, tagging on a couple of extra pizzas for their parents who weren't home from work yet.
The conversation between Sam, Steve, and Ella flowed freely, they'd known each other so long that they basically spoke their own language. But their banter and inside jokes were going over Bucky's head, leaving him slightly left out, the boys didn't seem to notice. However, Ella had been keeping an eye on him.
"Right!" She said interrupting the conversation, "it's time to get to know the new boy."
She smiled over at Bucky as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
"So come on, tell us, what brings you out here to this tiny town for junior year?"
"Oh... uh... my parents got a divorce."
Ella wrinkled up her nose, immediately regretting her decision to ask that question.
"I'm sorry. Massively put my foot in it there didn't I?"
Bucky was quick to reassure her. "It's really okay, it was better than them staying married."
"Okay, still, I'm sorry, probably not the first thing you want to talk about. But why here?" The confusion in her voice was evident, people rarely moved here.
"My mom's family is from around here, so she was moving back I guess."
"I see, makes sense. Is it just you and your mom?" Ella asked.
"I have a little sister, Becca."
"Want to stop with the interview Ella?" Steve teased.
"Sorry!" She looked at Bucky, hoping he hadn't been put off by her questioning.
"And stop saying sorry!" Sam joked, not for the first time. It was Ella's worst habit. Constant apologizing. For everything.
"Sorry," she said with a sarcastic eye roll.
The pizza arrived a few seconds later and Steve went to collect it. Silence filled the room as they all started eating, all starving after swim practice and running. When they were done, Sam looked over at Ella with a smirk.
"Why don't you invite Christian over?"
She saw Steve out of the corner of her eye trying to conceal a smile. It was no secret they weren't his biggest fans.
Ella shook her head and stayed quiet, usually, she would come to his defense, but she didn't have it in her today, and she wasn't sure how to explain that she didn't want to spend time with her boyfriend having barely seen him for the second half of summer. His parents had a beach house and he'd spent the majority of his holiday there with his family, as he did every year. Ella had joined him for a week at the start of August but had only seen him a couple of times since he got back.
"Am I missing something?" Bucky asked, to no one in particular.
Sam was quick to answer.
"Ella's boyfriend, Christian, is a bit..."
"Sam," she warned. She wasn't sure why, but the idea of Bucky knowing that she had a boyfriend, a boyfriend people thought was dull no less, made her want the ground to swallow her up.
"Sorry, sorry, my bad," Sam gave her an apologetic smile.
After that, the evening went more smoothly, no more jokes about Christian at least. Everyone made an effort to include Bucky, filling him in on school gossip, chatting about all things football, and sharing swim meet horror stories. Much to Ella's dismay, the boys also gave him a rundown of the single girls in their year. However, she noticed Bucky didn't seem too interested in that particular topic.
The three of them were pleasantly surprised at how well they got on with him. Their friendship group was small, only including Nat and Wanda outside of the people in the room, and hadn't changed in years. They'd never really given anyone else a chance, but Bucky fit right in.
Ella kept catching herself staring at Bucky, no one else had seemed to notice, she was sure if one of Steve or Sam had they would've cracked a joke about it. But what Ella didn't notice was that Bucky was sneaking glances back, and every time he cracked a joke his eyes went straight to Ella to see if she was laughing.
An hour or so went by before Ella moved to sit on the same couch as Bucky, she leaned back against the arm so she could face him.
"So, I've established that you like swimming and football, and when you're embarrassed your ears go pink. But that's all I've got on you so far. So come on, tell me something about yourself. What do you want to do?"
"You mean after high school?"
"If you like, if you've planned that far ahead," she said.
"I want to go to college, I just haven't found what I enjoy yet. I always kind of assumed I'd go to college as a way out you know, away from my parents and their constant arguing. But now they're separated, I don't really have that. I think I'll probably go somewhere a bit closer than what I was planning, cause I'll be going because I want to, not cause I'm running away. Does that make sense?"
Ella nodded. "Yeah. That makes a lot of sense."
"How about you? I'm guessing you're set on Penn?" he asked as he gestured to her college sweatshirt, his voice was gentle but his question took Ella by surprise. It also caught the attention of Sam and Steve who looked over at them.
She looked down at her sweatshirt. She didn't even realize she'd put this one on. A lump formed in her throat. It was a fair assumption on his part, but quite a way off. But then how was he to know?
"Not my sweatshirt," she said, trying as hard as she could to muster up a smile. She failed miserably.
Steve gave her a sad smile before he stood up and headed into the kitchen. Ella quickly got up to follow him, knowing he would be waiting to talk to her.
"Are you okay?" He asked in a whisper when they were alone.
"Yeah, Steve, I'm okay," she answered, her voice was quiet and unconvincing.
"I was really worried about you when you didn't show up to practice."
"I'm sorry, I should've texted. I didn't think," she said as she shook her head.
"It's just, after last time..." he trailed off.
"I know, I know. I promise it was nothing. Just wasn't in the mood to have coach shouting at me about how shit my backstroke is."
Steve chuckled, "your backstroke is pretty shit."
Steve wrapped his arm around her, pulling her in for a hug. This wouldn't have been a common occurrence a few years ago, but now it was natural. They'd learned to lean on each other a little more recently.
They made their way back into the living room, Sam and Bucky were laughing about something, and Sam gave Ella a quick thumbs up which she subtly returned. She looked over at Bucky, he didn't seem to be too perturbed by what had just transpired.
They all settled down into a comfortable conversation again. Bucky excused himself to get a glass of water not long later.
"Let me know when you want to go," she nudged him when he'd finished drinking.
"Now's good with me, I think I've sobered up enough. My mom isn't a big fan of me drinking," he replied.
"Okay, I'll just go and grab my keys," she said as she hopped up off the couch.
Ella made her way to the kitchen and fished through the key bowl for her car key as Bucky said goodbye to the boys. When she went back out into the hall, Bucky was already waiting by the door, looking at the family photo hanging on the wall. Ella went and stood next to him so she could look at it. She knew what he was going to ask, so she didn't wait for him to do it.
"That's Laura. Our big sister. She passed away a couple of years ago," she said quietly.
His knuckles brushed against hers as she spoke. It was as though electricity was running up through her fingers.
"We took that photo the day we dropped her off at college in Philly. Penn. It's her sweatshirt."
His thumb gently brushed the back of her hand.
"What happened?" He asked softly. "You don't have to tell me."
"It's okay. She was in a car accident, her friend was driving them home from a party, drunk driving," she explained.
Bucky let his hand find hers, he gripped it tight, hoping his touch would tell her everything he couldn't find the words to say.
They stood like that for a few seconds. Ella let her tears spill over, in over two years she hadn't yet been able to tell anyone about Laura without crying. The sound of someone coming down the hall broke them from their silence, and Ella pulled her hand away.
"Right," she gave Bucky a small smile, "let's get you home."
The car ride was quiet other than Bucky giving directions, the 5-minute journey seemed to go on for at least triple that. All Ella could think about as she was driving was how attracted to him she was, not in a romantic way necessarily, more in the sense that she could almost feel a physical pull towards him. In one evening and one brief conversation in the hallway at school, she already felt as though she had known him for years.
They eventually pulled up outside Bucky's house, but he didn't get out of the car straight away. Instead, he sat there, nervously wringing his hands in his lap.
"I like you," he whispered, not looking up.
She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the headrest.
Her heart said I like you too. Her head said but I shouldn't. Her mouth refused to pick a side.
Her deafening silence forced him out of the car, and he made his way to the front door, not stopping to look back. Watching him walk away hurt her.
Before Ella's mind could catch up, her heart took over. She unclipped her seat belt and flung open the door, leaving it hanging wide open into the road. She was running around the hood of her car.
"Bucky!" She called. Her mouth finally made up its mind about where it stood in her internal battle.
He froze. She reached out for his hand.
"I like you too."
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