KATHARINE BROUGHT THE PINK TEACUP TO HER LIPS, her pinky in the air as Morgan served tea to the other guests in attendance at her tea party. She grinned as Bucky clumsily took up the fake sugar, stirring the edible glitter into the lukewarm water the girl had served them before raising the cup to his lips as well.

    They hadn't meant to crash Morgan's tea party. Katharine had stopped by to pick up a stack of documents that would help reinstate her within the FBI while Bucky had been forced to tag along after Katharine found that he didn't have much to do that day.

    "Thank you," Katharine thanked the five-year-old girl as she refilled her cup. Katharine took another sip of water. "But Sir Bucky and I really must be on our way now."

    Morgan giggled at her faux British accent, standing from her chair and curtseying at her aunt. She dropped the teapot onto the table before rushing over, throwing herself into Katharine's lap.

    "Will you bring Uncle Spencer next time?" she asked, looking up as she laid across Katharine's thighs. "And Peter?"

    She grinned, tickling Morgan's sides before peppering her face in kisses. "Of course. I'm sure Uncle Spencer and Peter would love to see you again. I'll be sure to tell them how amazing a tea party hostess you are."

    Katharine helped Morgan back onto her own two feet before getting up herself, pulling the plastic crown out of Bucky's hair. She set it on Morgan's head, announcing her princess of the castle.

    "Take good care of your mom for me, yeah?" Katharine hugged the brunette child, leaving one last kiss on her forehead before exiting the home with Bucky not too far behind.

She slid into the driver's seat, twisting around so she could drop her bag in the backseat while Bucky climbed into the passenger's side. She adjusted her mirrors, smile falling away from her face as she pulled away from the Potts household.

"You're good with them," Bucky commented, watching as Morgan danced across the front yard and into her mother's arms. "Kids."

Katharine hummed, pushing her sunglasses up the bridge of her nose as she exited the property. She gave Happy a wave as he drove by, smiling before dropping the grin yet again. It wasn't that she didn't like the bodyguard, because she did enjoy his company, it was the fact that she wasn't particularly in the socializing mood anymore.

Being in the potts household reminded her of painful memories, ones that echoed Tony and Natasha's faces back at her. Even Nina swirled around in there at times, the thoughts of her old best friend practically haunting her at every turn.

Bucky had become her best friend, especially since it seemed Nina had completely disappeared off the face of the Earth. Pepper had said that Nina hadn't been snapped, so the possibility of Nina being lost and confused was zero-to-none. The most simple explanation was that the techie was absolutely over anything to do with the Avengers and SHIELD/HYDRA and had chosen to disappear off the face of the Earth, which Katharine could learn to respect.

But on the other hand, her attempts to search out the Puerto Rican hadn't been extensive. Especially since she almost got killed trying to enter the old lab back at the Avengers Tower in New York City. She figured that when Nina was ready, she'd come back. Katharine would give her whatever space she needed.

"Are you and Spencer planning on having any?" Bucky pried further. His hair, that had been tied back into a half-up-half-down situation, was now free of the scrunchie Morgan had put into it. "I could see you with one or eighty little ones."

If Katharine were drinking water, she would have spat it out. Her stomach churned as she thought of having children. "What's up with everyone wanting Spencer and I to have kids?" she questioned, keeping her eyes on the empty road ahead of her. "We'll have them eventually... just..."

Katharine shifted uncomfortably in the driver's seat, pressing down harder on the gas. It wasn't that she didn't want children. Tony's sacrifice had made it so their reality was safe and protected once more though she couldn't say the same about her personal reality. If she ever had children, they'd practically be walking targets for the multitudes of enemies she'd made over the years.

Suddenly feeling extremely sick, Katharine pulled over to the side of the road. She threw the car into park and ripped open her door, barely getting out of the car before she was spewing chunks over the countryside road.

"Fuck," Bucky swore, frantically unbuckling his seatbelt and opening his own door. He grabbed a water bottle from the trunk before coming to Katharine's side, holding back her hair as she dry heaved into the road. He helped her out of the car, closing the driver's side door before bringing her over to the grassy embankment on the other side.

He offered her the water, which she accepted with a pained smile. One hand went to her stomach while the other brought the bottle to her lips. She swished, spitting the bile-water mixture into the grass.

"Can you--" she pointed back at the car--"Mouthwash."

Bucky seemed to get the gist of what she was saying, hurrying back to the car and grabbing the Scope she kept in her go-bag. He handed the bottle of green liquid over to her, watching as she poured a mixture of mouthwash and water into her mouth.

She spat once again, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand as Bucky screwed the caps back onto the bottles.

"You feeling okay?" he asked cautiously. He eyed her up and down, observing the way her hand settled back onto her stomach even after she had settled. His eyes widened as he connected the dots--her attitude toward the topic of pregnancy, the vomit, the odd look of longing toward Morgan earlier at the house. "Katharine--"

"Stop," she ran a hand through her hair. "Not even Spencer knows yet. I was going to go see the doctor first before I confirmed anything."

Bucky furrowed his brows. "Wait, we've only been back a week. You wouldn't be experiencing 'morning sickness,'" he made air-quotes with his fingers, "until about six weeks into the pregnancy, how--?"

"Stop," she repeated, firmer this time. She put her hand over her mouth as she began to feel the nausea creep back up on her. She did not expect to be having this conversation on the side of the road in rural New York.  "Buck, I love you but you're starting to sound like Spence. And you may not be a genius but you're smart enough to put two and two together."

"You were pregnant when we fought Thanos the first time," he came to the realization. Katharine groaned. Hearing it out loud and just thinking it were two entirely different things in her book, and hearing Bucky verbalize it made it worse. "You shouldn't have even been fighting!"

"I know," Katharine said miserably. "But I couldn't let you guys down. Natasha and Tony did so much for me, and I--I just felt like I had to fight. I didn't just owe it to them, though. I owed it to Spencer and to Derek and my mom to at least try and do something about the end of the world. I wasn't going to just sit by idly."

"And no one was asking you to, doll. But, what if something had happened? What if--"

"Something did happen, Buck--" she groaned as she felt the bile rise in her throat once more. Katharine leaned over and vomited into the grass, coughing as Bucky held back her hair. He handed her the water once more. "There's nothing we can do about it now. What's past is past. The baby is fine, I'm fine, we're all fine." She swished another mixture of Scope and water in her mouth before spitting it out. "Now I know you haven't driven since the nineteen-forties, but do you mind driving?"

BUCKY WAS ON HIGH-ALERT SINCE FINDING OUT KATHARINE WAS PREGNANT. She would have been more annoyed if she didn't also find it endearing. If this was how her best friend reacted to her pregnancy, she couldn't wait until Spencer found out.

Bucky had driven them all the way back to Quantico, Virginia despite Katharine's insistence that she was fine after driving halfway into the trip, which was nearly nine hours long due to the pitstop they had made halfway through Maryland. When he got her home around six in the afternoon, he insisted on staying with her until her husband returned.

Katharine didn't mind the company especially since the company was helping her sort through all her old things that Spencer had put away. Most of it would go to donation while others--like a foldable clothing rack--would go into storage until it was deemed useless.

Spencer came home about three hours later, dropping his bag by the front door tiredly and rounding the corner to join his wife in the kitchen only to be greeted by a muscular man that was most certainly not Katharine.

"Uh, what--?"

Katharine breezed out of their bedroom, sweatpants rolled up around her waist and one of his old T-shirts draped over her frame. She paused to press a kiss to Spencer's cheek, welcoming him home before effortlessly gliding into the kitchen where Bucky stood holding a sheet of freshly baked cookies in his metal hand.

"Oh, hey Spencer," Bucky greeted, waving at the doctor with his other hand as he set the burning hot tray down on the far end of the countertop. "We made cookies, do you want some?"

Spencer blinked a few times, trying to register the exact situation he had just walked into. After all, it wasn't every day that he came home from work to find his wife and her best friend baking cookies while said wife's best friend wore a 'Kiss the Cook' apron that he had saved as a joke. "Uh," he walked into the kitchen, settling at Katharine's side. He wrapped his arm around her waist. "I'll have one."

Katharine leaned into his touch, picking up one of the cookies they had made earlier and breaking it in half. She offered the cookie to her husband, feeding him the desert.

"What's the occasion?" Spencer asked as he swallowed his half of the cookie. Katharine shrugged, picking up another cookie and stuffing it into her mouth.

Bucky looked between the couple before reaching behind his back and undoing the ties. He took the apron off, hanging it on the hook near the stove before taking up a tupperware container of cookies. "I'll see you tomorrow, певунья." Katharine rolled her eyes at his extra way of calling her Songbird as he rounded the counter, pulling her in for a side hug before waving at Spencer. "It was nice seeing you again, Spencer."

"Likewise," the genius responded, a tense smile on his face. The couple sat in silence until they heard the front door close. The deadbolt clicked into place and Bucky drove off, the sound of his motorcycle ripping through the quiet streets until it faded off into the distance.

Katharine shoved yet another cookie into her mouth, chasing the desert with a rather large gulp of milk.

"So what's the occasion?" Spencer asked again, softer this time. He took up another cookie, taking a bite out of the disk-shaped and warm goodness.

Katharine pulled a folded piece of paper and slid it over to him, busying herself with another cookie as he inhaled the information at supersonic speeds. He read the sheet over again, just to be sure that his eyes weren't deceiving him before looking up at Katharine with the widest grin on his face.

"Are--are you serious?" he asked, holding the paper up. "You're pregnant?"

"We're pregnant," she corrected him. "And this one's real, unlike that bitch you never told me about." She rolled her eyes. "Really, Spencer? Prison?"

Spencer's eyes widened. "Who told you about that?"

"Unimportant," Katharine waved him off. "But what is important is that I didn't hear it from you." She cocked her head to the side. "Spencer, you know you can still tell me anything, right? I might not be the hot older woman you managed to bag anymore, but I'd hope you'd still be able to trust me with things like this." She tried to get him to meet her eyes. "Spence, I could have helped you."

Spencer looked away in shame. "I just didn't want you to have to worry about me."

Katharine cupped his face, gently making him look at her. "Spencer," she said softly. "I'm always going to worry about you. I don't think of it as a burden. It's an honor to be able to fuss and fret over you, baby."

"You say that now," Spencer grumbled, putting his hands over her's and turning his head so that he could press a kiss to her left palm. He stepped closer to her, hands falling to her waist. His thumbs massaged circles into her hips as he pulled her closer. "Just wait a few more years, we'll see if you're still saying that."

    Katharine giggled, wrapping her arms around his neck as he kissed her. He hoisted her onto the counter, careful of the cooling cookies that decorated half of their kitchen. They had about five years to make up for and Spencer wasn't about to waste another second of it with talking.