Ch. 1: the mission
You would think, wouldn't you, that seventy years of pain and heartbreak would warrant some fun once in a while. That after his best friend somehow came back from the dead and then tried to kill him, after his kind-of boss also came back from the dead as some rogue exile, after he spent a day infiltrating the very organization he once worked for with some of his friends just to get shot by his now-evil best friend, fall into a river, and then get dragged out of that river by the aforementioned best friend, all to stop a genocide, he could have some fun. Go to the movies, go out for a nice dinner, that kind of thing.
Instead, Steve Rogers is sitting on his couch, picking at a pack of Starburst, because that's all he has, okay, and he doesn't quite have the energy to even pick up his phone to order dinner, let alone buy groceries.
He's pretty sure God, or SHIELD (what's left of it, anyway), or Nick Fury, or whatever divine being is controlling his life had decided that the past month had been too good to him and that he needed some drama. He'd finally gotten Bucky back, had finally started doing missions that he believed in, and he'd been working so closely with Nat that they'd become extensions of each other's thoughts, one unit moving against the enemies of the earth.
Nat. He can still see her, tense, fists clenched, in Fury's office. He'd stared at her through the window for so long, wondering what Fury could possibly be telling her, that he thinks he'll die with that image burned into the back of his eyelids. After four hours, he decided that there was no logical, sane excuse for standing there and staring through the window for any longer, so he'd packed up reluctantly and headed out after one last glance through the glass. He'd gone straight home, too worried to do much else, and parked it on the couch.
They'd come so far since that conversation in the car, driving away from the Apple store. They'd both been alone, both in that moment and for their whole lives. He'd wanted a friend. Her? Maybe not. Or maybe she had. He hadn't been able to read her, then, back before he'd saved her life and realized that he trusted her to save his too.
After that, things were different. They started getting better. Her attempts to get him dates stopped after they'd kissed undercover a second time for reasons he kept himself from thinking about, but her jokes about his age kept him laughing through every knife fight, every gun battle. She'd started to answer his questions honestly. They'd become friends.
He's in the middle of wishing he had taken the time to figure out how to work an iPhone, because maybe then he'd actually have some pictures of the two of them, when there's a knock on the door.
Nat's there, because of course she is, with two boxes of what looks and smells like Chinese food, and through the hazy cloud of relief Steve is suddenly aware of the acute hunger that is roaring in his stomach.
She holds the bag up by way of saying hello, and Steve steps aside to let her in.
"What did Fury want? I was surprised that he called you in alone, you know, since we've gotten literally every mission briefing together since he got shot and we thought he'd died. And if you wanna grab two plates from the shelf, I can pull up a movie or something. I got a DVD of that one spy movie, I know you always like laughing at how inaccurate they are—" he stops as he turns around and Nat's face, pale like he's never seen it, comes clearly into focus. "Wait, what's wrong?"
"First of all, grandpa, nobody uses DVDs anymore. I guarantee you that movie's been on Netflix for at least five years."
It's a brave attempt at her usual unbothered demeanor, and maybe anyone else would take it, but Steve's worked with her for too long and they're friends now, damn it, so he notices the little twitch in her eyes and the little slump in her shoulders and decides that Fury is going to pay for whatever happened in that office.
"Also, the only people who like those spy movies are people who work nine-to-five desk jobs and have never seen a gun in their entire life. How difficult would it be to interview a spy or two? Just to get some details? It's not like it's that hard—"
She's rambling, now, and it's so uncharacteristic that Steve can't help but think it's kind of cute, except he's definitely not allowed to think that and it definitely also means that something has rattled Nat pretty badly, so he cuts her off. "What did Fury want?"
"So anyway, you should really ask Sam to set a Netflix account up for you and you should learn how to use it because—"
"Nat," he says, and the force in his voice surprises even him. "What did he want?"
She stops, finally, and Steve notices that she's only holding one plate. "This is just for you," she says, putting it down in front of him. "I know you don't eat when you're supposed to. I, uh…I won't be around for a while."
"Won't be around," he repeats.
"Yeah. Nick…uh… gave me a mission. Just me. Says you're too recognizable, and it's a solo mission anyway."
"A mission," he repeats, and wonders why he can't seem to formulate his own sentences. With great difficulty, he says, "is it dangerous?"
Nat lets out a bitter laugh. "Aren't they all?" Then, at the look on his face, she sighs. "I mean, yeah. He wants me to go undercover. Apparently, there's some organization out there that's terrorizing cities, stealing food, drugs, weapons, things like that. It wouldn't be anything big, but they're headed up by a guy the police can't stop and who Nick thinks wants to take over every place they're in. Some ex-military guy who calls himself Ammo?"
"So he wants you to—"
"Infiltrate the gang, yeah, and then bring it down from the inside. It could take months, maybe years. I leave tonight, pretty soon. And obviously, I can't have any contact with you, or anyone from this world, or they could find out who I really am. So I, um, just came to say goodbye. Or whatever."
Steve stares at her in stunned silence.
"And I guess—I guess I just wanted to say that I've never, you know, been that close with people I work with, Clint being the obvious exception, and then after he went back to his family and SHIELD was compromised I think I felt really alone, and you helped me find my place in this world and restore my belief in what's right. And I know I'm terrible at emoting, and just handling emotions in general, but if something happens, you know, and I never see you again, I just wanted to make sure you know that you really mean a lot to me and that I never, ever took our partnership for granted."
She's looking at him, now, really looking at him, and there are tears in her eyes that he's never, ever, seen before, not when she watched the big green form of the man she'd finally opened up to vanish from her screen, not when she watched her mentor and boss flatline through a hospital window, not even when she took a bullet to the shoulder, and it's that shocking display of emotion that jolts him back to his senses.
"Nothing's going to happen to you," he manages to say, but he can tell it's weak and knows she can too.
"Sure," she says, and there's that look in her eyes again, that look she'd given him a split second before she'd kissed him on that escalator, that look that had flashed for a millisecond when he'd implied that she'd look great in a bikini, that look that had lingered for a little bit longer when he'd been forced to kiss her as they'd snuck a second hard drive out of a lunatic's headquarters and had haunted his dreams for weeks. He wants to hold on to that look for as long as he lives.
Instead, he takes a step toward her and says, with more conviction this time, "Nothing's going to happen to you. You're Natasha Romanoff. The most badass assassin of all time. You hold your own against genetically modified beings and crazy robots engineered to kill you. Ammo won't know what's coming."
Of course, deep down he knows that there's a good chance Ammo also falls into one of those categories, but Nat undoubtedly knows that and besides, she's taken another step towards him and she's so close he can hardly breathe. There's a beat of silence.
"For the record," he murmurs, "you mean a lot to me too. And everything you said about feeling alone and belief systems and all that? You did the same for me. And I'm honored that you chose me as the recipient of your one emotional conversation for the year."
She rolls her eyes, cracks a smile, and says, "Oh, shut up," but before Steve can say anything she's kissing him like he's never been kissed before, and he's kissing her back and it's somehow both exactly like that undercover kiss and nothing like it at the same time. And he feels it, feels that thing inside him that he hasn't felt since he'd looked at Peggy Carter for one last time, that thing he'd pushed down after the escalator and after he'd pinned her against the wall by that vending machine and after the hard drive, except this time it's roaring to life and he can't stop it, doesn't want to stop it. He thinks it's maybe feeding off of the feeling of her arms around his neck, of her back pressed against his hands, and the only thing running through his head is that he wants this to last forever.
Except it doesn't, because some divine being has it out for him and a car honks outside, which causes Nat to pull back.
"Wow," he says, breathlessly, because it's the only thing he has the ability to say at the moment.
She smirks, knowingly, and it's that familiar sight that allows him to regain his vocabulary and sense of humor. "So how do I know this isn't just some spur-of-the-moment, end-of-the-world kind of thing?"
"When have I ever made out with someone because I had to save the world?"
"Well, I don't know, you kissed Bruce right before you pushed him off a cliff, so—"
She shoves him, and they're both laughing, and it's so them that Steve can almost forget that she's only here because she's about to leave for who knows how long, but then the godforsaken car outside honks again and the smile on Nat's face vanishes immediately.
"Listen, I have to go. Keep that burner phone, alright? Don't change your number. Just in case." There's a sort of desperation in her eyes that chills Steve to the bone, and he thinks that if she asked him to climb into a hive of bees with that look in her eyes he would do it.
"Of course," he says, and he grabs her. "Nat—be careful."
"Always," she whispers, and then there's one last kiss on his cheek and she's gone.
When he wakes up the next morning, he wanders into the kitchen and sees a stick of pink bubble gum on the counter that was definitely not there the night before. There's a note attached to it that says:
Think we have enough shared life experience, yet? ;) You were right—not being all things to all people can be a tough way to live. Thanks for knowing who I really am, and for being my "all people." —Nat
It's an obscure reference to that conversation so long ago in that car, the first time they'd really talked about them. And even though Steve had laughed at Nat's use of an emoticon, he's now staring at the note with tears streaming down his face because it's real, she's gone, and there's no telling when he'll ever even talk to her again.
Going into work is going to suck.
NOTES:
hello kiddos and welcome to my first ever fic! I wanted to get better at writing narrative-style and although i really love steve/bucky I've been a capwidow stan since the beginning of time, so here we are! come along for the pain ride, set somewhere after winter soldier but only partly, bc bucky is also healthy and sane. I really fucked with the timelines so this is, like, almost an au. Just go with me on this
this fic is VERY heavily inspired by elsaclack's "i've been sleepwalking too close to the fire", found on ao3. i don't know her (so sorry if this is weird lol) but that is probably my favorite fic of all time and is a fic you should all read before you die
all titles, main and chapter, are titles of songs from different mcu scores, because I love pain (and also movie scores)
If anyone wants a trigger warning for anything, lmk! I'm happy to put 'em
you can find me on tumblr stolethekey! This fic is also on ao3 if you prefer that site (I definitely do)!