January 28th 2017
Somewhere on the Avengers Compound grounds
"Did I ever mention how much I hate running?"
Only about 700 times.
"Did I ever mention how annoying you are?"
"Come on, lover boy. You love me really."
Ember wasn't technically allowed out of the compound. But since she was with Steve, and since it was still on the Compound grounds, as long as it was completely under Steve's supervision, she could go for a run with Steve.
Yes, she would've preferred to stay inside. She would've stayed inside in her god forsaken jail cell.
"Please stop calling me that."
"No."
"You call someone that when they're in love. I'm not."
"You're in love with me. We've established this."
Steve rolled his eyes as they jogged further up the hill. He was going at a much slower pace than he liked, but Ember couldn't keep up.
"You're the one who keeps saying you want to sleep with me." He muttered under his breath, jogging slightly ahead of her.
"I heard that." She was struggling to keep up, but caught up with him and tried to match his strides eventually, "And who wouldn't want to sleep with you? Have you looked in the mirror?"
Steve ignored her and kept running.
"You don't talk much, do you Rogers?"
She was running out of breath, but determined to keep... Talking.
Steve just made some sort of grunt noise, but no real words came out and he kept running.
"C'mon, dude. I'm just trying to make conversation so this is slightly less awful."
"Ugh, I hate you." He mumbled under his breath.
"It's not good to lie to yourself, Rogers."
The rest of the run was pretty average. Ember flirted the whole time. Steve returned none of it, well he returned some, but only with glares.
The sun was rising over the hill they had just ran up, and now ran back down. And the compound entrance was coming back into view.
"Hurry up, I have to take a call in the conference room with Tony about the mission they're on."
"You're just saying that to make me run faster."
"No, I'm not. He just let me know right there that I need to call him."
"I don't believe you." And just to annoy him, she slowed down to a walk.
"Rose hurry up."
"No."
"Yes."
"You're so annoying."
"You love me."
Steve let out yet another sigh of annoyance.
"Rose, hurry up. I can't deal with your crap right now."
"No."
"Rose they're on a mission. Lives could be at stake and you're walking at a snail pace."
"I quite enjoy my snail pace, thank you very much."
"Fuck you, Rose."
"Wow, language, Captain. What has come over you? But I mean, if you really want to — Go ahead."
Heat flushed to his cheeks, but he turned his head in the other direction to avoid Ember from seeing it.
"Sorry for cursing." He said quietly as Ember finally begun to run to catch up with him.
"I'm just a bad influence on you."
"Yeah, you make me want to scream."
"In what way, Captain?" She asked, the smirk tugging on her lips.
"That's it. We're done here." He said, opening the door to the compound aggressively. "I'm going to call Tony."
"I'm coming with you."
"No. You're not."
"Shut it, Rogers."
Steve wasn't in the mood to argue. Instead he just sped quickly along the long, never ending, twisted corridors of the Avengers Compound, until he reached the conference room.
Tonys face was already on the screen. The room illuminated only by the light coming from the video call.
Steve flipped the lights on and sat in one of the chairs that faced the screen.
"Rogers." Tony addressed with a curt nod.
"Sorry I'm late, Tony. I was doing stuff." He said, annoyance laced his voice.
"By stuff he means me." Ember sat in the chair next to him.
He had lost count of how many times now, but again Steve went red.
"We weren't—" Steve stuttered, "We were training."
"Training?" Tony teased. He had noticed how worked up he got around Ember and her jokes and flirting, and he found it amusing to have someone other than himself to tease Steve all the time. "So it was that kind of stamina training, huh?"
Tony smirked from behind the camera.
"Excuse me?" Steve's mouth fell open. "No— What? Of course not."
"Rogers don't lie to me. I seen you two making out from the security footage I have that covers the grounds."
"Tony! That wasn't us, I swear!"
Ember covered her mouth with her hands to stifle her laugh, and Steve heard Natashas laugh come from the other side of the camera, her body out of view.
"Calm your shit, Rogers. I'm joking, I'm joking."
Ember let out the laugh she was trying to stop.
"Rose. I hate you." He turned to Ember to face her, a look of anger, and yet again, annoyance, in his eyes.
"You love me."
January 28th 2017
Avengers Compound
By the time night fell, Steve had barley spoken to Ember at all since their morning training. She knew he had been in the training room all day, practically ripping the punching bag apart.
Every time she walked past the training area, he was always still there, taking everything out on the bag.
It had started when he came off of the call with Tony. Unfortunately when the meeting started, Ember had been kicked out of the conference room, and told to go back to her bedroom. Steve said he would come and find her, but he never did, so instead Ember took it upon herself to try and find him. When she did find him, he was in the training room, and had been there ever since.
That was a few hours ago, and he hadn't moved from the same punching bag, the only time he moved more than a few feet away from it was to replace the bag with another because he had beat it up so much it had literally exploded.
He had destroyed 5 bags today already.
The next time Ember walked past, she was on her way to the kitchen and once again noticed that Steve was at the same spot, at the same punching bag.
Ember leant against the doorway and watched him. She couldn't help but feel bad for him. He was tearing himself up over something that she would probably never find out. Over the time she had known him, she had learned that Steve was such a closed off person, he doesn't open up, everything stays locked up inside, and the only people that are allowed a key are the ones he trusted. And most of the time those people were Bucky, and Bucky only.
"Hey." She said, still against the doorway.
Either Steve didn't hear her, or he was choosing not to acknowledge her presence.
"Rogers." She said, louder this time.
Steve's harsh movements stopped and his arms fell to his side. The punchbag eventually stopped moving before he turned around.
"I'm not in the mood for your dumb games just now, Rose."
Ember frowned.
"Rogers you've been in here for hours, surely that's not good for you—"
"Don't." He snapped, "Just go, please."
"I'm trying to help-"
Steve snapped his head around to face her again.
"Help? You've done anything but that since you got here."
"Rogers move your ass out of this room and into a shower, and then meet me in the kitchen." She said sternly.
"No, Ember."
She couldn't help but smile at his casual use of her first name.
"I'm making macaroni. Be there in five minutes. I went out and bought my own mac and cheese after Barnes went off at me for stealing his, and I'm gonna be nice and share it with you."
"Rose-"
"Be there."
January 28th 2017
Avengers Compound
How Ember managed to burn the macaroni, she had no idea. It was literally coming from a packet.
"Fucking crap, shit, going to fucking sue this macaroni company. Fuck." She complained, throwing curse words left, right and centre as she tried to unstick the burned macaroni from the bottom of the pan.
"I swear to god I'm gonna kill someone." She muttered, banging the pan against the countertop, as if that would actually work.
"SHIT." She dropped the saucepan on the ground.
She bent down to try and clean up the mess, but the literal charcoal pasta was proven difficult to clean up.
"You've made it clear that you're capable of many things. But I didn't think burning packet mac and cheese would be one of them." Came a voice from the doorway.
Now it was Steve's turn to lean against the doorframe, although unlike Ember earlier, he wasn't watching sadly, he was watching full of amusement.
"What can I say? I'm full of surprises, Rogers."
"I can see that."
Ember had managed to scoop the rest of the burned pasta into the pan, and just flipped the bin lid up and threw everything into the trash, the pan included.
Steve raised an eyebrow, along with a disappointed frown.
"Relax, icicle. Starks a billionaire, buying another kitchen utensil isn't gonna kill him."
"I'm gonna head into town and pick us up some food, I don't trust you to not burn the entire compound down."
"You don't have to-"
"I'm starving, Rose. Do you want something or not?"
"Uh, yeah. Just get me whatever I don't mind."
Steve curt nod and walked towards the door.
"FRIDAY lock all of the doors once I leave, and don't allow Rose to use any stoves or ovens when I'm not here."
"Seriously? Come on dude."
"I don't trust you."
"Yes you do."
"You're too annoying to trust."
"You love me."