Chapter Text
Chapter One: A Bottle for Jemmy
Oregon Settlement, 1842
The baby was wailing his head off. James Buchanan Barnes, Junior had a hell of a set of lungs on him, Steve would give him that. The baby boy was nearing three months old, but Steve would swear that the screams were louder than a pack of wolves howling and could have woken the dead. But there was one thing the wailing couldn’t do.
Crying wasn’t going to bring his mother and father back.
A year ago, Steve had put his last bouquet of simple daisies on his beloved mother’s grave before meeting up with his best friend, James “Bucky” Barnes and his brand new bride, Natalia. Natalia wasn’t quite a mail order bride. Bucky was enough of a handsome young man to not need one. But when he got into a card game he couldn’t win against a mysterious man with a nearly indistinguishable accent, Bucky turned from neighborhood ne’er do well into someone’s fiance in the time it took to lose one hand.
It was Natalia’s idea to move West. And it all happened rather quickly. Money was procured out of nowhere to pay for their long journey. Horses, a wagon and the deed to a cabin in Oregon were placed in Bucky’s hands by Natalia twelve hours after they got married.
Apparently, she couldn’t stay in New York much longer. Steve wasn’t sure if it was because of problems with the law or problems with the Forty Thieves gang. He strongly suspected she had run into problems with the Forty Thieves gang and he was even more sure two weeks later when he caught her stealing salted meat from an awful tyrant in a small town in New Jersey and distributing it to hungry neighborhood children.
Steve liked Natalia a lot. They were quick friends and it was Natalia that had told the man he rented a room from that he would no longer need it. It was Natalia that had packed up all his worldly possessions when he had been out looking for work that was never there. It was Natalia that had told him in her slightly Russian accent that she and Bucky would never be able to make it on their own. So Steve smiled, nodded and told her that he would never have been able to make it in New York without Bucky or her any longer.
Bucky and Natalia had been married one week after that lost card game. They definitely hit it off right away.
Because Jemmy, as he was called by his mother, was born nearly nine months after his parent’s one month anniversary, three days before the trio of settlers staked their claim on an isolated cabin close to the Clackamas River. Bucky and Steve had spoken with the other travelers heading west and they knew that their future well being would have to happen through animal trapping and trading furs.
Steve desperately wished that they had made a different choice. Natalia had been so insistent to get as far away from New York as she possibly could. But Steve wished that he could have convinced Mister and Missus Barnes to settle in California instead.
“Ssssshh, Jemmy. It’s alright, it’ll be alright,” Steve murmured to the baby he had tried to strap to his chest as he rode the three miles of rough trail into the nearest town.
“Tis the last rose of summer, left blooming alone,” Steve sang softly as he tried to cradle the boy tightly now as the road got rougher at the last little stretch. The babe could barely hold his head up, even though Bucky had insisted his boy was the strongest and best boy in the world. A babe shouldn’t be riding horseback into town, Steve knew that, but he had no other choice.
Once he finally hit a more even road, the little street of the town was in sight, Steve realized that his choices weren’t many now that he was in town. Natalia had been one of the only women to travel westward with the men, and she had been the only one to go this far. The town was full of men who were trapping and hunting and looking to make money and a place for themselves before setting out to bring a wife westward.
His only choice was the saloon.
And he knew the saloon was essentially a front for a whore house. Three ladies who had ended up in Oregon, somehow. Steve didn’t judge them. That wasn’t his job to do so, the Good Lord above was the only one who was qualified to do so. Steve had read the bible plenty. Jesus had been friends with prostitutes. And a person deserved to make a living in any way they could. Steve colored as he eased himself off of his horse.
He’d been a tiny little thing his whole life, then at the age of seventeen, he’d sprung up like a weed, almost like magic. The year long trip westward had somehow added muscles and bulk, thanks to a protein rich diet that Natalia was prodigiously skilled at miraculously procuring no matter where they were. But now at the age of twenty-two, Steve was still no man of experience. Bucky teased him good naturedly about it and Natalia thought it was precious. Steven Rogers was actually a man of no experience.
And the ladies at the saloon made him blush all the way up to his ears.
Jemmy made a whimpering wailing sound and Steve squared his shoulders and took quick steps towards the saloon.
“Well hell boy, what’ve you got there?” the barkeep demanded.
Stark. His name was Anthony Stark, Steve thought. His moustache was ridiculous and the few times Steve had met him, he’d been so annoyed by just about every inappropriate thing that had flown out of the barkeep’s mouth. Steve fought a scowl and rocked Jemmy against him gently.
“I need a wet nurse for this little one,” Steve said quickly. “Any of the ladies---”
“Ppppssssh,” Stark waved him off. “My girls can’t be using their finery to feed any warbling babies. Never had any reason to use their---”
He paused and gestured to his own chest with a cheeky wink.
“Assets that way. No wet nurses available in Oregon, boy. Where’s the little squawkers ma?”
“Don’t know, went off to check their traps and haven’t been back,” Steve winced as he bopped Jemmy back and forth. “He needs to eat.”
“I got some porridge cookin’ for the morning crew,” Stark shrugged.
“You can’t give porridge to a babe that little, you silly fool!”
Steve almost smiled at the look of annoyance that crossed Stark’s face, but then a very small little blur came in from the kitchen and smacked Stark across the head with a wet cloth. She was a tiny little thing, and definitely wasn’t painted up like one of the ladies that worked in the saloon. For one, she was wearing britches. Too big for her and held up by suspenders. Her shirt mostly fit, except across the chest, where it was strained against an ample bosom.
Curly brown hair hung down her back, wild and unchecked, and her face was smudged with what looked like ash from the fire. She had big blue eyes staring at Steve in concern, and pouty pink lips were pushed into a frown as Jemmy continued to wail.
She nodded once before hopping back behind the bar and grabbing a glass bottle that was freshly washed.
“The goat’s milk, Starky,” she said quietly.
“I need that for tonight’s special!” Stark guffawed. “I’m naming it Mary's slippery nipple.”
“You give me that damned milk or I will waste this nice clean bottle on the useless pile of horse shit on the top of your neck that you call a head!” she threatened.
“Damn, Darcy, you need to watch your language, there are little ears present,” Stark grumbled, reaching under the counter and pulling out the goats milk.
Steve watched as the little woman, who was definitely not one of the three ladies of ill repute who worked upstairs, poured some of the milk in a bottle, then added some clean and fresh water. She pulled off a little piece of rubber from one of Stark’s bottles of whiskey, pinched it into a tight peak and poked a hole in it before rushing to Steve and holding out her hands expectantly for the baby.
Steve wordlessly pulled a miserable and wailing Jemmy from the sling he had made up and handed the strapping little man to her. Jemmy quieted immediately in Darcy’s hold, staring up at her with big, blue, curious eyes. The woman’s touch seemed to calm the baby and his head immediately began burrowing against Darcy’s bosom in hopes of getting some sustenance.
Bucky had crowed that his son was the cream of the crop at birth, and Jemmy had been growing and fattening up ever since, and the fattened little man made Darcy look even smaller as she cradled him expertly and popped the bottle in his mouth. He took to it immediately, suckling like his little life depended on it.
“That’s a fair bit easier than spoon feeding him,” Steve sighed in relief. He had been struggling with giving the wee little one spoons of milk for the last two days.
“Where’s this little man’s mama?” Darcy wondered as he continued to drain the bottle down.
“Lost...her and her husband, my friend Bucky---”
“This is Natalia’s baby boy?” Darcy looked up in horror.
“Yes, ma’am,” Steve nodded, wondering how this young lady knew Natalia. They’d only been in Oregon a short three months, and Natalia had a nursing baby, she didn’t have a lot of time to go socializing in town. “They’ve been missing two days, went to check the traps and never came back.”
“Savages,” Stark shook his head. He sighed and admitted, “Technically, they had dibs here, so you can’t blame them for trying to protect what used to be theirs, but----”
“Don’t call em, savages , Anthony!” Darcy glared at him. “They’re people like you and me. The all nearly died ten years ago from the fever. And they have a name, the Kalapuya...”
“Tell that to the little man in your arms!” Tony argued, seemingly for the sake of arguing. “He’s an orphan now thanks to those people that are supposedly just like you and me.”
“He's NOT an orphan! I---I gotta go and look for them, but I need help,” Steve interrupted meekly before Darcy could keep arguing with Tony, which she clearly wanted to do. She was passionate and seemed to definitely know what she was talking about. He’d liked what she had to say, too. He’d learned on the long journey out West that the best way to survive is to co-exist with the people who technically owned the land. Bucky and Natalia had been less willing to entertain his progressive issues, but this lady in britches and smudges on her face sounded like himself after his tongue was loosened enough with the whiskey. He looked at her beseechingly and asked as humbly and respectfully as he could, “Miss Darcy, please, would you come and help me with Jemmy?”
“Hold on just one minute there, boy,” Stark looked worried. “You can’t take her, she’s my cook---”
“What’s your name?” Darcy demanded.
Steve couldn’t place her accent for the life of him. It didn’t sound like his Irish-tinged lilt of New York City. And it wasn’t Natalia’s barely hidden Russian bent to words. It was slang he recognized from travelers from down South, just barely, but enough to recognize.
“Steven Rogers, ma’am,” Steve nodded, lifting his cap a bit.
“Darcy, you were meant to stay here,” Tony hedged. “You can’t go and live with a man like that unmarried, I don’t care for how long it is…people’ll talk and then you’ll be working upstairs here instead of down.”
Steve opened his mouth to tell the barkeep to shove it but Darcy fixed Anthony with a mean glare that had him holding up his hands in easy defeat.
“Please,” Steve whispered earnestly, looking at Darcy as Jemmy finished his meal. He watched as the tiny little buxom woman put the bottle down on the bartop and brought the baby up over her shoulder to burp him. Steve held Darcy’s gaze with his own, fierce and blue and earnest. “Miss Darcy, please .”
“Oh, those eyes are going to be a lot of trouble for me, I can tell,” Darcy murmured as she felt Jemmy’s little hands reaching for the collar of her shirt, baby soft skin hitting her neck haphazardly. She took a deep breath and turned to face the beleaguered barkeep. “Anthony....I’m taking my goat with me.”
"Aw, Darcy. But I love Mary!"
Steve approached the big cabin that he, Bucky and Natalia had staked their claim on. It was plenty big enough for the three of them and the baby, but Steve and Bucky had been building onto it, in anticipation that Steve could eventually get a wife of his own out here in the West.
Steve had never ever believed that he could manage such a thing. Single women were a scarce commodity past the Mid-West, and certainly any woman that'd want to come out and rough it wouldn't want him. He wasn't like Bucky, he had no natural way with women. Mostly, he just sweated through his shirts and got nervous.
Case in point, Darcy was riding in front of him on their shared horse, cuddling the baby to her bosom in her new and improved sling. She'd worked out a way to get Jemmy so close to her that he barely could wiggle, which seemed like a much safer way for him to ride. The baby was much happier cuddled to Darcy’s ample bosom, preferring it to Steve’s rougher muscles, for sure.
Softer was better, Steve knew that by now. He knew it the moment he had hopped up on the horse behind Darcy.
Darcy’s whole back was pressed tight against Steve's front and his arms were wrapped around her in order to take the reins. A little cart was attached to the horse's rig, containing all her worldly possessions and Mary, the small goat that Darcy had argued with Anthony about taking. Steve had been shocked by her foul language (Natalia only cursed in Russian), but once Darcy had gotten Jemmy into her baby sling, she'd taken a shot at him, boxing Stark soundly on his ears and telling him it was her goat to begin with and Stark could jump off a cliff.
"You's done a good job of building up those new posts, there," Darcy remarked quietly, turning her head so that Steve could hear her. "That'll be a fine house when you're done. As fine as any house in the East."
"You from the East?" Steve managed to croak out as she wiggled in front of him. He swallowed nervously and hoped she couldn't feel what she was doing to him. He'd never been so close to a lady before and he hadn't realized her backend would be so soft and warm against his body.
"No," Darcy answered simply.
"You were born in the West?" Steve furrowed his brow. He'd never met a person over the age of fifteen that had been born to the West. Darcy shrugged. "Miss Darcy, how old are you?"
"Not polite to ask a lady her age," Darcy muttered.
Steve thought about that. She carried herself like one of those older ladies who ran the boarding houses back in New York. Like she was confident, brash mother of seven who didn't take any kind of nonsense from no one. But she looked to be not a day over sixteen, if he was being honest with himself. She didn't paint her face like the working ladies at Stark's Saloon, and maybe that's why she looked younger in comparison.
"You got parents that'll worry over you?" Steve asked.
"I don’t---I mean, that's none of your business," Darcy said resolutely.
"Are you and Stark---are you his lady? I mean to say, is he---are you his intended?" Steve stammered.
Darcy scoffed at that, "I wouldn't touch Anthony Stark if my life depended on it. He's a friend to my friend and I landed here when I couldn't go with them . 'Sides, Anthony's got a lady. Real rich one too, back East."
"Oh, good," Steve nodded before he could stop the words from coming out of his mouth. He winced.
"Don't be gettin' any fresh ideas, Mister, I ain't marrying nobody," Darcy insisted as Steve slid off the horse quickly and led him into the little outside building they had designated as a stable. Her voice sounded like a laugh was curling around the edges of it, just wanting to poke through and tease him into blushing redder than an apple. " 'M just gonna come out and help you with this little'n here until you find Natalia and her husband, and then be on my way."
"I really appreciate your help," Steve nodded, reaching up tentatively to help Darcy and Jemmy down. "I'll get you all settled in the house and then I gotta go and start lookin' for 'em."
"You ain't goin' anywhere tonight," Darcy disputed, her own cheeks flushing as Steve wrapped gentle hands around her waist and brought her feet to the ground. "Storm’s coming in."
Steve looked outside at the sunny skies with a frown. It certainly seemed like a pleasant enough day to him. He'd left with Jemmy at daybreak and he thought it might get a little hotter as the sun rose higher in the air, but that was about it.
"My hairs curlin' up something fierce, and it always does that before a good soak," Darcy insisted. "Janie used to say my hair could tell the weather, she said it was science. She knows about a lot of stuff. Real smart, Janie is."
Steve had emptied the little cart, backing Darcy's goat into a little pen just the right size for him and throwing in a couple heaping handfuls of hay.
"Janie your sister?" Steve wondered.
"Yeah," Darcy shrugged. "Well, you know, closest thing to sisters without sharing blood."
"Where is she?" Steve wondered.
"Left me behind once she got her fancy fur trading Swedesman. He said it weren’t no place for an unmarried woman and he couldn’t protect the both of us,” Darcy said bitterly. "I can protect myself just fine, thank you. Did it for near ten years. They said they'd be back for me when they were done with their grand adventure, but it's been going on five months now and I ain't heard from them once."
Steve grabbed the unusual bag Darcy had packed. Instead of wood handles, it seemed to be carved out of some kind of animal bone, and it definitely wasn't ivory. Instead of thick heavy fabric, it was made out of something a little like leather, but not quite. Either way it was full to the brim of little things she'd easily packed, and it still didn't seem too heavy as he led the way out of the little barn and up the path to the big cabin.
"Can you get a pot of water to boilin?" Darcy asked. "Some of it I need for Jemmy-boy's bottles and some of it for bathin' and cookin and drinkin’.”
Steve nodded, he could do that. He'd been dumbstruck on what to do with Darcy's bag. There was just the two rooms with beds in them. One with the big lumpy bed that Bucky and he had built and filled with straw and a smaller one with Steve's bed that had already been there. He didn't know where to put Darcy's bag and he was thankful for something else to do.
"Goodness gracious, this is a sty!" Darcy wrinkled her nose as she followed Steve to the kitchen, which was along the back wall of the cabin, kept cooler by the shade. She shook her head as Steve began the wood fire in the open Franklin stove that had been abandoned in the cabin by the previous owners.
Steve twisted his mouth into one of contrition.
"I've been busy with the baby, and didn't have a chance to---"
"Don't give me that, Mister, this is a well lived in sty!" Darcy disputed. There were dirty tin plates and cups on the long work table of the stove, along with too many crumbs and food bits and abandoned rags.
"None of us three are great at cleaning," Steve admitted, going to the corner where a basin of water sat. He filled the biggest cauldron they had and brought it back to the stove, setting it up to boil. He looked back at Darcy with big, earnest eyes and shrugged helplessly, "Bucky and me, we never had to tend a kitchen, the rest of the house is clean, I promise. And Natalia isn't really an ordinary type of lady. We just---forget?"
"Well. I don't forget," Darcy shook her head and undid Jamie's bindings. She handed the peacefully sleeping baby to Steve and said, "Put him down, and then get on back here, I'll teach you how to clean a kitchen proper. And Good Lord, man, what have you been eating?"
"Salted fish?" Steve shrugged with a little smile that made Darcy want to pinch at his cheeks a little. He was so guileless and genuine and absolutely hopeless. His stomach gargled with hunger loud enough to have Darcy's eyes widening in surprise.
"Go on, put the babe to bed, then once you help me clean this mess up, I'll cook you a proper meal. You ain't chasing after your friends today, not unless you want to get soaked to the bone and end up dead in the bottom of a mudslide for your troubles.. I'll feed both of you boys up proper today and tomorrow is a new kind of day, Steven Rogers."