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Another Lifetime
In another lifetime, he is discontent but satisfied with his life (in another lifetime he is a disillusioned soldier with the only satisfaction is his fist plummeting a helpless punching bag to keep him company).
In another lifetime, his best friend is killed in action and all he got was a lousy letter offering empty condolences. (In another lifetime, his best friend is alive but is suffering manipulated puppet soldier).
In another lifetime, Peggy is alive but has no idea who Steve Rogers is – she is the one to give him the letter notifying him of Bucky's death. She gives him a small comforting smile had he looked up to meet her eyes they would have connected. Steve's focus is solely on the letter shaking in his hands. The grief, he thinks, is unimaginable since the trembling letter tells him that there will only be an empty casket to bury. (In another lifetime, Peggy is alive and full of love for him…a moment passes, she is alive and full of love for him…a moment passes, she is alive and full of love for him, they tell him she has Alzheimer's).
...
In another lifetime, he becomes a super soldier dies in a cold arctic grave. He wakes up in façade that is too perfect to resemble a true 1940's infirmary. He makes friends. They die and he keeps on. Sometimes, in this lifetime, he wishes bitterly he would have stayed a runt. Then he would die peacefully.
...
In another lifetime, he is found in an arctic grave and he sees an angel. He marries that angel and she gives him two children, fraternal twins – a boy and girl. She dies at birth.
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In another lifetime he is a woman, she marries her best friend and watches him leave when the second wars begins. It is his smile that she cherishes the most. It was the smile he wore on their wedding day. It was that smile he wore when she beat all odds and gave birth to a healthy little boy. It was that smile he wore when she last saw him as he is shipped out like the perfect soldier boy and she wore a tight ear-splitting grin, but she is proud and she tells her son to be proud too.
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In another lifetime, in his lifetime, he is a disillusioned soldier with the only satisfaction is his fist plummeting a helpless punching bag to keep him company. (He prefers this lifetime, Steve thinks). It is one day when his drowning in his sorrows when he meets a new friend; he is different from Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes. He is loud, obnoxious at times; he is a crass gentleman of the twenty-first century. He talks a lot (he cannot hear the bombs going off in a war-torn Europe). He pushes, pokes, and prods until he looks and listens.
They talk of nothing but of simply being. They are two human beings having a normal conversation. Steve sees his disillusionment reflecting in those ever lively shadowed eyes.
Steve sees all, and he wants to laugh at how hard this man tries to seem normal. Sometimes they fall asleep watching movies together (he wakes up the first time hugging Tony's foot to his chest. Tony sleeping like the dead, but Steve thinks it must be uncomfortable to lay down like that – his face smushed on the carpet with half his torso hanging off the couch).
Steve prefers this lifetime because he has moved on with his life and at least he finds happiness with his obnoxious best friend. Tony is loud, but he is the one who eventually convinces him to take out Sharon. And when Steve is nervous on what to wear (which is silly now that he thinks about it – Sharon doesn't care about those things (Beth did, but Beth was Beth and it makes no sense to compare the two)).
Steve is happy in this lifetime because learns to overcome his bitterness. And Steve thinks, that his ghosts are happy that he learned to let go.