Nightingale
Hello my dears, I’m posting yet another Bucky story (i’m obsessed with the character I know)
I’m currently working on Chapter 4 of FWB and When Winter Met The Sun but i need some inspo for the morning after situation and the plot for WWMTS.
But for now, enjoy my slightly different story. Btw, super slow burn in this one, as the reader is a teenager and I, in no way will promote any sort of smut between an adult and an underage reader without warnings or a darker themed story, which for now this isn’t so yeah. Let me know if you wanna be tagged.
Max de Bourbon was not a normal girl. That much, was obvious from the beginning.
Found on April 7th 2001 by a geography expedition, in the Amazon Rainforest of South America no less, Max’s early memories include a ranger named Luka and an orphanage in Rio de Janeiro. No one knew where she came from, who her parents were, how the hell she managed to not get killed in the Amazon (filled with snakes and various other things that could quite easily kill a child), what her name was, how she got there or what to do with her. National Rangers and local and national authorities put out searches for her, but no one claimed the little girl. And so, she was dubbed an orphan.
Taken to a local hospital to be assessed for injuries, they came to the conclusion she was three and a half years old, had no illness that needed medication and was psychologically in a sound state. When they asked her questions, they came to the conclusion she was smarter than most kids her age, she talked like a 10-year-old. She was stronger than most kids her age too. But, she still had no parents.
That’s where the orphanage in Rio de Janeiro came in. The Sisters of Ave Maria ran an orphanage on the outskirts of the city where she was raised among other kids who had no parents. They named her Lolita. That was Sister Angela’s idea. She liked Sister Angela, she was kind, taught them lots of things, how to cook and clean and taught them Spanish while Sister Emeline taught them Portuguese which was necessary being the native language of Brazil. And so, she grew up multi-lingual.
Max didn’t mind the orphanage, they were all friendly. Except for Carlos, Vince and Dominic. She didn’t like those three. Even though Carlos seemed to rather like her. They played in the street, soccer of course, until the street lights came on and the sisters where sure that every child was safely back in the house. Max always knew they weren’t completely safe. There was a lot of crime in Rio. So, the older kids always watched out for the younger ones. Sofia was like her older sister, until the day she was adopted by a rich couple from Spain.
Max often wondered when she would be adopted. She was 7 when it happened.
Her savior came for her August 3rd 2005.
Adaline Marie Taylor was the most beautiful woman Max had ever seen.
She was moderately tall, with raven hair, lightly tanned skin, bright hazel eyes and a most beautiful smile upon her seemingly glowing face.
She worked for Doctors Without Borders with her fiancé Louis de Bourbon(pronounced loo-wee, not Lewis, he insisted). She was in Brazil for her job and with her they brought their nine-year old daughter, Lily with them. Apparently, she’d been in an accident some years back that left her unable to have children and so she was looking to adopt. They never imagined they would adopt through their job. They never thought having to treat a little boy would result in them adopting said little boy and another little girl.
Adaline had checked out Max, like she did with all the other girls, and was fascinated by her intelligence, she was only 6, but spoke rather eloquently and was incredibly bright. Max had spent a whole hour showing Adaline all the math she had learnt that week. She also showed her around the place and told her about all the children at the orphanage.
As it turned out, Adaline and Louis both came from old family money and due to Max, helped get all the children adopted. But not before they adopted her. Well, her and one other.
Max spent her time with one boy in particular. He was new, only two years old and named Christopher.
And so, after deciding together, Adaline and Louis adopted Lolita Maria and Christopher Angelo on September 17th 2005. Lolita even chose a new name for herself. After watching Get Smart (the original TV show) with Louis and seeing all the cool things the Maxwell Smart could do, she had decided her name would be Max. and no matter how hard they tried, Max wouldn’t answer to anything other than Max.
“It’s a boy’s name Addy” Louis sighed while they both lay in bed.
“I have an idea, but for now, go to sleep” Adaline smiled softly at her fiancé’s protest.
“What’s the idea?” Louis said straightening up a little.
“Tomorrow, now go to sleep” she said while switching off her light.
“Sleep, Louis” she said sternly.
And so, with a sigh, Louis de Bourbon fell asleep.
The next morning, while Max was sure she was going to be called by Lolita, she got a surprise.
“Max, Breakfast is ready” Adaline’s soft voice called from the kitchen.
Max, was absolutely ecstatic. Her plan had worked! It had really worked!
As she sat there and ate her blueberry and choc chip pancakes in that wonderful Rio hotel room, Adaline started to ask her.
“So, about this name thing” she said while setting down her spatula and leaning over the counter. “I like this Max idea, it’s very unique, it’s strong. But Louis being the boring old fart he is doesn’t so we agreed on something” Adaline told the ever so curious and suspicious Max.
“We did?” Louis asked looking thoroughly confused.
“Yes, Louis, last night” Adaline said in an overly sweet tone.
Understanding the tone in her voice, he simply watched to see what this so-called agreement was.
“We decided, that your name will be Mackenzie” Adaline said causing a halt to Max’s happy pancake scarfing.
Mackenzie? What the hell happened to Max?
“Now, just here me out” she said upon seeing her daughter’s disapproving look. “On all the certificates and the boring paperwork, your name will say Mackenzie, but we and all your friends and family can call you Max” Adaline said.
Upon hearing this proposal, Max looked to be in very deep thought as her Dad watched her very intent and thoughtful look, doing his very best not to laugh at the cute face she made when her brows furrowed and she scrunched up her nose a bit.
“So kinda like how your name is Adaline, but Louis calls you Addy?” Max asked.
“Exactly like that” Adaline said with a snap of her fingers.
After a second Max smiled her rather adorable little kid smile and said a content little “okay”
Adaline looked at Louis with a sort of “I told you” look while he rolled his eyes and went back to watching Barbie with Lily.
And that, was how Max went from Lolita to Max.
Mackenzie Avery Charlotte Lolita de Bourbon.
And the little boy, Christopher, became Reuben Christopher Michael.
Max had insisted on choosing his name too, much to Lily’s disdain, who wanted to call him Joshua (after her crush who was staying two doors down from them).
It was October 17th when they went to England.
Max could already speak English and so Adaline and Louis weren’t too worried. It was Reuben that would need adjusting.
Max got to see lots of new things when she went to England. She got to go to the airport, eat something called a donut, follow Lily everywhere, watch suitcases move on some weird moving circle thing, meet a whole bunch of “flight attendants” as Louis called them, sit in a window seat with Adaline, which again, Lily (who got the aisle seat) was not happy about AND she got to fly. She didn’t like the landing too much (and neither did poor Reuben who cried his little heart out) but it was lots of fun.
When they got to London (which was apparently where they we’re going to live) they took her to see lots of things. The Big Ben (why they called a clock Ben she would never understand), Buckingham Palace (that she thought was completely awesome, she also decided she was marrying Prince William), Trafalgar Square, The London Eye, St Paul’s Cathedral (which was pretty, but became less so after she had to go there for Easter church the following year), Tower Bridge, The British Museum, Hyde Park (she decided this was her favourite place ever) and London Zoo.
All in all, Max’s first week in London was rather enjoyable.
Plus, she got her own room.
They let her do whatever she wanted with it.
So, she painted the walls a rich emerald green (the color reminded her of the forests in Brazil), put pictures up of all sorts of animals, got a white bed with matching furniture and stuck little stars on the ceiling that lit up at night. Plus, she got like eight teddy bears.
It was four months after bringing them to England that they went on holiday to Spain.
More doctoring it seemed for Adaline and Louis.
More doctoring and adopting. This time, another little girl. A year younger than Max, Marie was honestly someone who could pass for her biological sister. Like Max, Marie had caramel-russet skin, almond shaped chocolate brown eyes and dark brown, almost black hair.
In fact, if you looked at their family you wouldn’t really say that three out of four children were adopted. Adaline had the hair and skin all the children had, it was just the eyes. Lily inherited her father’s honey colored eyes, Reuben had stunning bright green eyes (something both Max and her new sister grew to hate about him), Max had the brown. No one got Adaline’s eyes. A lighter shade of hazel, green on the outside, brown on the inside.
This little girl, decided to rename herself as well, except she was much fussier about the process than what Max was. Eventually, after thorough research, little Marie decided on Samantha and so she became little Samantha Elizabeth Marie de Bourbon.
And thus, their family grew by one more member.
It was a month after bringing Sammy home that Adaline and Louis noticed that Max was different. Max was not normal. Max didn’t get sick when everyone else got sick in the house. This was quite odd, seeing as even her parents, who were doctors and had a higher tolerance for sickness would get sick before she did, not that it happened often. Max also didn’t get need stitches the one time she sliced her hand on the turkey carver on Christmas Eve, when both her parents inspected the cut and knew the cut was deep enough to warrant stitches. When the got to the hospital, the cut only needed cleaning and a bandage to prevent infection. A week later, and the mark was completely gone. It was then that they knew, Max was special. Deciding to keep it to themselves, it was kept that way for only a week.
While at the holiday home out in the country side, Reuben thought it might be fun to go play with some branches underneath the old oak tree by the south side of the property. Max watched him rather intently, he was pretty much her little diamond to protect from the world. While he played there was an audible cracking sound that Max had heard. Suddenly, what was clearly an extremely heavy branch, snapped off the tree and fell, heading straight for the younger boy. Max looked up, her had instinctively in the air and suddenly instead of falling, the branch was floating. Lily screamed. And when Adaline and Louis looked up from Sammy’s new doll she was showcasing, they could hardly believe what they were seeing,
It was then they decided, Max could never let this be known. Louis knew the dangers of this sort of thing. He had an old ex colleague of this, Thaddeus Ross, who hunted people for this sort of thing. And he would die before he let Max become one of his test subjects. After what happened to his friend Bruce, he’d never let Ross near his children.
So, they sat their children down and explained, Max was special, she could do thigs that other children couldn’t. But this could be dangerous, because not all people were nice, some people wanted special people to be in trouble for doing nothing other than existing. They made each of their children swear not to tell anyone about Max. and they didn’t. Even Lily held her promise, this was clearly important.
At first, Lily didn’t like it. Lily didn’t like it at all. It was just what she needed really. First three siblings. Now one with magic powers? Great. Less attention for her. Her grandparents knew about Max too. And Max’s godparents and some of her Dad’s most trusted colleagues. They helped Max try control it. Lily just wanted someone to take her to ballet lessons and not worry about stupid Max. so naturally, she hated it. At least until Bobby Carroll was mean to her on the playground of their school in front of everyone and acorns started flying at his head from behind. All she saw was Max’s rather arrogant, yet discreet smile, and she knew what had happened. After all, she was getting good at doing the same thing with the baseball for their dog. Yeah, they also got a dog. Fluffy little golden retriever named Winston. It also, was more tolerable when Max made Miss Hill’s coffee explode in her face when she tried to give Max a detention for calling Stacy Lewis a clueless idiot. Lily didn’t like Stacy much, so this made her like Max a little more.
When their grandparents visited and Max showed them stuff, Lily became annoyed again. That was before her grandmother noticed and told her of all the important things Lily would have to do. To keep her sister safe, be a protector. What she didn’t know was that her grandmother made her father put her in karate class to further this little story so Lily didn’t feel so left out. But it was cool. She could beat the boys in arm wrestling in under 20 seconds. Always.
Max didn’t really know what to think of it Not at first. Then Adaline’s mum, Grandma Winnie sat her down and told her she was special. She told her stories about Captain America, another special person. She said she was a good person. But she had to keep it secret. Because it was so rare it was basically unknown. “Human beings tend to fear the unknown”. The words she hadn’t forgotten.
But her Dad helped her control it. Her Dad, her godfather and godmother Jason and Lucy Phillips, her uncles Toby Spencer and Michael Tierra, they taught her all sorts of things. Self-defense, meditation, Tai Chi. All to help her. And it worked.
When Max was 11, the unthinkable happened. Adaline discovered she was pregnant, with twins. Nine months later, Max had two baby brothers. Aiden and Miles. Max’s life couldn’t get any better. Everything was going well.
Until the accident anyway.
Aged 14, Max had gone to a party and had gotten drunk to the point where she had to be picked up by her parents. Driving peacefully (Adaline and Louis decided to have the talk with her the next morning when she was sober) she remembers few things. Only Adaline muttering something along the lines of “move to the States, brilliant idea” “bad idea” and “14 years old and alcohol?”. And then a bang. A really loud bang. And the heat. Fire. Then there was a second bang which sent the car swerving. And then a third at which flames roared to life and had Max flying out of the back window, off the bridge and into the lake. She was dazed. But she did remember one thing. As she flew out of the window, she saw men, dressed in all black. She passed out before she hit the water.
She was found the next morning, four miles from the site, washed up on the banks of the river by an older couple and their son who were out for a morning walk. George and Mary Stevens and their 20- year old son Tommy were shocked to find the girl, but brought her to their home giving her water and juice to wake her up she couldn’t remember anything. Not even her name. In and out of consciousness they immediately drove her to the hospital where a fellow Doctor, Julie Michael’s recognized her colleagues’ young daughter.
Checking her out, there were no obvious injuries. Nothing to worry about. Until she suddenly remembered everything. Her parents. What had happened to her parents? She couldn’t stop having panic attacks. No one could cam her down. Then her best friend, Kiera Summers, who was notorious for learning things before anyone else did heard the sheriff taking about an accident involving the de Bourbon family and she had her older brother drive her straight to the hospital where she searched every ward before finding Max. she asked the doctors what had happened and she explained to her friend what the situation was. Her parents were both in surgery. And there was a great chance they wouldn’t make it.
Lily came back from college distraught. There was a boy with her. Caleb Andrews. While Lily was in shock, this Caleb person explained he was her friend and was more than willing to help them or talk if they needed to. Apparently, he had lost his mother while young. The next few days were hell. Max went numb. Caleb made them all food while Lily did her best to comfort her siblings. Their grandparents all flew down from England and France respectively to help organize their guardianship. It was then that her parents will was found.
It was then decided. Until Lily was done with college and was able to look after them, Katie Nichols, their mum’s best friend was to look after them. She was Lily’s godmother and was married with no children. Daniel, her husband, was nice enough. They moved to bigger house two streets away but kept the house. Things slowly began to return to normal. Sort of. Lily went back to college, became a doctor like her parents, specializing in comatose patents and brain damage. Max, Sammy and Reuben all went back to school after a month. Aiden and Miles began kinder late but not too late. But things were somewhat normal.
All had returned to normal.
Except for Max’s powers. They seemed to vanish.
Loss due to trauma or something like that.
Boy was she in for one hell of a surprise couple of years down the track
