Work Text:
1. Peggy doesn't actually see or hear Jarvis tell Angie about the ability to call one room from another, but the uncomfortable and embarrassed expression he has as he gives one last mention of the phones to Peggy before leaving tells her everything she needs to know about how informed Angie is of the luxury in which they now live.
Her conclusion is only reinforced when the line in her room rings about ten minutes after Angie bids her goodnight from her bedroom door.
"Hello, Peggy Carter speaking," she answers smartly, smiling affectionately when muffled giggles trickle through the receiver from Angie's side.
"Miss Carter, do you know what a will is?"
Angie tries to pass off her voice as a man's, pitching it down and adding a resonant bellow, but it's definitely Angie, and Peggy is too endeared by her roommate's puckish nature not to play along.
"No, sir," she replies with just a touch of the impish dramatic, enough to make Angie nearly break character, "What is a will?"
Angie has to take a moment to quiet her giggles before eking out, "A dead giveaway!"
Peggy chuckles, though it's more at Angie's unabashed laughter from the other end of the line than it is at the joke she's heard more time than is necessary.
"I'm sorry, English, I just had to see what you'd do!" Angie gasps out brightly around her laughter, shuffling about on her bed loud enough that Peggy can imagine the picture she must make - flopped childishly on her stomach, one foot kicked up to swing in the air.
"It's perfectly alright, Angie," Peggy replies, cradling the phone against her ear as she leans back in her desk chair, "I'd nearly be disappointed if you didn't try it at least once."
"Hey now!" Angie chastises, but Peggy can hear the smile in her voice, and she laughs indulgently at the chance to tease Angie like this.
"Go to bed," Peggy orders in the middle of her chuckling, leaning forward to focus on the paperwork Angie interrupted. "You know what they say - tired actresses never make it to Broadway."
"Spoil sport," Angie gripes, blowing a raspberry through the phone before hanging up on her side, and Peggy laughs deep and loud as she hangs up her phone, her lips quirking into a smirk for the rest of the night when she manages to catch the impossibly faint sound of Angie's snuffling snores.
-
It takes weeks before the novelty wears off, but Peggy enjoys those pranks calls more than she's willing to admit.
2. When the phone rings in Angie's room, it takes a moment for the heavy fog of sleep to clear enough for her to recognize what it is she's hearing. It takes another moment for her to question whether or not she actually heard anything in the first place, but when the phone rings again, she slaps a boneless arm over the receiver and drags it towards her face.
"Hullo?" she slurs, not quite awake enough to even be angry at the late-night call.
There's silence on the other end, and sleep is slipping over her once more as her eyes drift shut for a moment.
"Anyone there?" she tries again, her hand barely keeping the phone in place against her ear.
"It's just me, Angie. I'm... I'm sorry for waking you."
Peggy's voice jars something in her enough to push herself up off her pillow with one arm. "Peggy? You ok? What's wrong?"
They've been living with each other for nearly 2 months now without incident, but part of Angie always suspects another moment like the one in the Griffith, with Peggy clinging to the side of a building, asking for Angie's help to get her out of a pinch.
On the other end of the line Peggy releases a deep breath, and Angie's doesn't know if she's hearing sleep-addled things when her brain tells her Peggy sounds like she's about to cry.
"It's been a long day, and a longer night," Peggy explains meekly, her voice contrite as it whispers through the line. "I just wanted- I needed to hear your voice."
"Oh, Peg," Angie breathes, snapped fully awake by Peggy's words. "What can I do? You wanna come over for a bit?"
"No, no," Peggy insists, and Angie pretends not to hear the sniffle that comes through muffled from Peggy's end of the line, "I don't want to keep you up. I probably shouldn't have called, it's terribly late-"
"I'm gonna tell you about my day," Angie cuts in, wiggling herself up to sit against her headboard. "And if you still feel crummy we're gonna go downstairs and scrounge up something good to eat. And if that doesn't work, then we'll break into that wine cellar that I know you and Jarvis conveniently forgot to mention in the tour. Alright?"
Peggy doesn't say anything, but Angie imagines she can hear Peggy smiling.
"You're the best, Angie," Peggy finally says quietly, and Angie doesn't imagine the warm flush that washes over her at the other woman's words.
-
They never make it to the kitchen, but they do spend the rest of the night on the phone, and Angie doesn't regret going to work tired the next day one single bit.
3. Peggy wonders if she's been pulling too many all-nighters in a row when she comes home for the night and immediately has the thought that Angie's purse hasn't moved from where it was sitting this morning. She creeps towards it carefully, noticing Angie's coat as well, and that hasn't been moved either. Her instincts are telling her something is very, very wrong, but she ignores them for a moment when the telephone rings.
"Hello?" she answers, eyes darting around the front hall to see if anything else is suspiciously not out of place.
"Peg? Is that you?"
It's Angie on the other end of the line, and Peggy is startled by how miserable she sounds. "Angie? Are you alright?"
"No," Angie moans, her voice echoing in a way that tells Peggy she's dragged the telephone over to the bathroom. "I caught that stupid bug from one of the girls at the diner, and I've been puking since I woke up and-"
Peggy doesn't let her finish, swinging into the kitchen to grab a glass of water and some saltines before charging up the stairs and into Angie's bedroom. Sure enough, the line for the telephone trails across one side of the room to the open bathroom door, and Peggy finds Angie curled up on the tile, her face pressed against the edge of the bathtub.
"Oh, darling," Peggy breathes, setting the glass of water and saltines off to the side before sliding down to Angie's level and pulling the clammy, pale woman into her arms.
"English?" Angie groans as Peggy cradles her head against her shoulder, gently stroking sweat-slicked curls away from Angie's face.
Peggy shushes her quietly, reaching for the glass of water and bringing it to Angie's lips. Angie sips at it greedily, though Peggy is sure to control how much she's allowed to drink in one go.
Peggy figures the worst of it must be past, as Angie's stomach settles enough for her to begin to drift off, and she feels a sharp pang of guilt that no one was around to take care of Angie.
She feels doubly guilty that she wasn't around to take care of Angie.
As if she can read her mind, Angie burrows deeper into Peggy's embrace, snuffling weakly against Peggy's chest.
"M'glad you're here, Peg," she murmurs sleepily, "Dunno what I'd do without you."
Peggy smiles wistfully, brushing back more hair from Angie's face.
-
It takes her a week to realize she'd called Angie 'darling', and another to realize she doesn't regret it.
4. Angie doesn't know how Howard fixed it, but somehow the only phone that ever rings when someone calls the house from the outside is the one in the front hallway. It's nice, when Peggy needs to be on-call for one thing or another and Angie needs some sleep, or when Angie's waiting for a callback and Peggy has to do paperwork.
Which is why it's damn terrifying when every phone in the house begins to ring at once.
Angie shakes the fright off with a jerk of her head and picks up the closest phone. "Hello, Angie Martinelli speaking."
"Miss Martinelli."
It's Jarvis, and Angie relaxes, leaning her hip against the table the telephone is on and crossing her arm.
"You sure know how to scare a girl," she snarks, quirking her eyebrow up as if Jarvis can actually see her. "Am I special, or do you give all of them the 21-phone salute?"
"Miss Martinelli," Jarvis repeats, and something in his voice shuts Angie up real quick.
"Miss Martinelli, I don't have much time, I'm having to route the call through the house and I- Miss Carter has been injured and I need- I don't have enough hands-"
"Where," Angie bites out, her hand curled white-knuckled around the phone line. Jarvis rattles out the address, and Angie gives herself just enough time to grab her purse before sprinting out the door, tearing down the street in a way she hasn't since she was a kid back in Harlem.
-
Peggy is back on her feet in a few days, but afterwards, Angie never quite manages to not flinch when the phones rings.
5. Angie knows something is up when Peggy leaves for a few days with only a few hours notice, only to come back nervous and avoidant. Normally she would wheedle something out of Peggy, knowing that people like Peggy needed enforced decompression occasionally, but she has news of her own since Peggy took her short trip, and she's caught up in her own thoughts too deeply to push the subject.
Still, they end up sprawled out on Angie's bed, comfortably close to each other with thighs and shoulders touching as they stare at the ceiling.
Angie's been pretty good at keeping things on her end light and coy enough that Peggy can chose to ignore her more intense moments, but the thoughts that swirl in her head reinforce how woven into her life Peggy is, and she is painfully aware of every place they touch, of every gesture both she and Peggy make. It's a heady, dizzying thing, and for the first time since she admitted to herself exactly what kind of emotions ran deep in her heart for Peggy, the words to express that form whole in her throat and heavy on her tongue, and she opens her mouth to speak them.
"I'll be just a moment, Angie," Peggy interrupts instead, standing from the bed and walking out the door towards her own room.
It's a farce, Angie considers as her thoughts continue to swirl, their sleeping quarters. The first days of Peggy's recovery after that one scare had required her to stay in the same room with Peggy, and the nightmares and panic that had plagued her after that had drawn Peggy back into Angie's bed, the two women never quite addressing their want or need to sleep entwined against the other. Angie's room is their room, filled with all of her things and most of Peggy's, and Peggy's room is now Peggy's spare bedroom, used more as a cozy office or emotional hideaway when paperwork calls or she and Angie fight.
Angie's train of thought stops abruptly when the phone in her room begins to ring, and she picks up the phone with more than a little hint of trepidation, glancing in the direction of Peggy's room before answering. "Hello?"
Peggy is silent for a long moment on the other end, and Angie's smart enough to know that whatever it is that Peggy has to say is about to change everything irrevocably.
"Angie... I've been given a promotion," Peggy hedges, her voice nervously breathy through the phone line.
"That's great, English!" Angie enthuses honestly, feeling a sharp spark of pride and excitement over Peggy's accomplishment.
"In Washington, D.C.," Peggy finishes, rushing through the words though Angie feels each one of them like a dull thud in her chest.
She pauses for a moment, letting the words sink in, her head running through a dozen different responses in the span of a second. She knows that whatever she says now will determine everything that goes after, and as much as her heart is screaming at her to be selfish, she's given consideration to this situation happening and already decided how to handle it.
"Even better!" she gushes, using every acting skill she has to keep any tremor out of her voice. "It's about time someone noticed you!"
Peggy is quiet for a moment. "You're ok with this?"
Angie forces herself to ignore her emotions for a moment and focus instead on Peggy. "Of course I am, English. This is your big break! You've worked hard for it, and I'm glad someone is finally giving you your due. On to bigger and better things, right?"
Peggy heaves out a deep and, more importantly, relieved sigh, and Angie knows that she made the right decision.
-
As happy as she sounds with Angie approval, Peggy doesn't return to their room that night. It's the first time Angie's slept alone in months.
6. The house Howard sets Peggy up in once she's in D.C. is perfect, truly, with everything she'd ever want, and yet...
It doesn't have Angie, some part of her mind whispers as she stares once more at the still unfamiliar living room, and she grabs ahold of that traitorous thought and shoves it deep into the back of her mind.
Angie was happy, she tells herself once more as she settles onto the couch. Angie was supportive and happy and very liberal with her approval.
Is that why, the little imp of a voice in her mind starts up again, she didn't bother to tell you about her big break?
Peggy's a logical woman. She can understand it from Angie's point of view. She didn't want to steal the spotlight from Peggy's moment, and once Peggy had agreed to run S.H.I.E.L.D., there was little time for the two of them to talk, and Peggy is sure that Angie would have told her, given the proper time.
It doesn't make the sting from having to hear about it second-hand 3 weeks after the fact from Howard of all people hurt any less.
The phone, conveniently placed beside her, begins to ring, and Peggy lifts it to her ear out of instinct. "Peggy Carter speaking."
"...Peg?"
It's Angie.
"Angie," Peggy breathes, sitting up expectantly before painfully remembering that this isn't their house in New York, and that Angie isn't sitting in the next room over on a different line.
"How are you doing, English?"
Angie is quiet, uncharacteristically reserved, and Peggy wonders at how they've grown so far apart in so little time.
"I'm doing well, Angie," Peggy replies, weighing her choices of how to proceed in this conversation. "I heard you finally caught your big break. Congratulations."
Angie sucks in a nervous breath that Peggy stringently pretends not to notice. "Yeah, it's- It's a good production, and I got the lead. I- I was gonna tell you, Peg, I swear but it all got so jumbled up with you leaving and-"
"It's alright," Peggy soothes, her shoulders dropping the tension she hadn't realized was there.
The line is silent for a moment, before Peggy decides to extend an olive branch.
"I miss your phone calls, you know," she confesses, clutching the phone line in her free hand. "Those pranks you used to try and play, and those times I could just call you in the kitchen to bring something up."
Angie laughs, and Peggy's chest warms with the sound.
"I miss knowing you were a call away," Angie confesses in return, and her voice is so wistful and yearning that Peggy begins to have her doubts about Angie's feelings regarding her move.
"Angie," Peggy sighs, glancing down at her personal journal that sits next to the phone on the side table. One of her notes catches her eye, and she takes a moment to consider something she'd missed.
"Angie," she begins slowly, still staring at the note to herself, "how are you calling this number?"
"Uh," Angie drawls uneasily, and for the first time Peggy can hear the birds calling in the background of Angie's call.
The same birds she can hear in the backyard of her house.
There are only two phones here, she thinks distantly as she drops the receiver and springs to her feet - one in the living room, and one in her bedroom.
Her head considers stalling at the door to her room, filled up as it is with too many variables and possibilities, but her body overrides that thought, bursting through the doorway and straight into the path of Angie, who stands nervously at the side of her bed.
They both stare at each other, and Peggy is scared to move, too afraid to break whatever moment is happening between the two of them.
"How did you know?" Angie asks weakly with a laugh, shifting her weight from one foot to another.
"They only just set up the phones," Peggy replies distractedly, too caught up in taking in the woman she hadn't realized she'd desperately missed until now. "Not even Howard has my number yet. I'd forgotten until I saw it written in my journal and-"
Whatever she might have wanted to say is cut off by Angie, who crosses the room in a few strides and yanks her forward into a kiss.
Peggy freezes for a moment, and then sighs, wrapping her hands around Angie's waist and pulling them flush to each other. Angie's kisses are strong, forceful, grasping at skin and clothes and hair like she's somehow trying to kiss Peggy hard enough to compensate for all the time they wasted, and Peggy feels it all the way to her toes, using the advantage of her height to tip Angie's head back and kiss her with all that passion in return.
"I want you, Peggy," Angie gasps out between kisses, keening with a shudder as Peggy licks hotly into her mouth but standing her ground. "I can't- New York ain't it for me if it doesn't have you."
That snaps Peggy out of her daze, and she rears back to stare at Angie, dumbfounded.
"If this is your way of saying you're choosing me over the opportunity you've spent 2 years working towards, then I refuse to be a part of it," she warns lowly, holding Angie still by her shoulders. "I want you, too, Angie, more than... more than I think I realized, but not if it means losing your chance at chasing your dreams."
Angie blushes, smiling sheepishly as she ducks her eyes. "Actually," she drawls, stroking her fingers absently over the curve of Peggy's hips, "I was more thinkin' a 75/25 setup. I spend weekdays working on the play, and come the weekend-"
"-you can stay here. With me," Peggy finishes softly, already swaying back towards Angie's embrace.
Angie nods, biting her bottom lip for a moment, "I'll have to stay in town when the play's on 'cause of shows but the director said that'll be a few months, and Howard said he'll be back and forth between cities anyway so why not use his car and-"
This time it's Peggy that pulls Angie into a deep kiss, breaking off after a long moment and smirking as Angie sways in place.
The phone next to them rings loudly, startling them both, and Peggy picks the receiver up before sharing a confused look with Angie.
"Peggy!" Howard's voice blasts out through the line before Peggy even has the receiver fully to her ear. "How goes it? I take it Angie found that key alright?"
Peggy cocks an eyebrow at Angie, but Angie merely rolls her eyes with a huff, snatching the phone from Peggy's hands.
"Yeah, Howard, I found it alright," she snarks, propping a hand on her hip, "now buzz off and let me kiss my girl in peace."
Angie slams the receiver back into place as Peggy slides forward and uses Angie's distraction to nip at the curve of Angie's throat.
"You know he'll call right back," she murmurs into Angie's skin, drawing her hands up the length of Angie's back.
Angie blindly reaches out, managing to knock the phone off its receiver before Peggy begins walking her back towards the bed. "Screw the phones," she pants breathlessly, and Peggy grins wickedly before murmuring her agreement.
-
Howard gloats about deserving a reward right up until the moment Peggy drops their phone bill on his desk with a sharp smile. He never mentions needing a reward again.