Title: Can You Feel My Heart Again?
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~1,900
Characters: Steve/Natasha
Prompts: "Steve reacting to a hurt Natasha in the field, or him asking her if she'd be his girlfriend, or him asking her on their first date..."
Summary: He knows she can't see it for herself, but Natasha is the most vibrant person he's ever known. She comes into his life with her little grins and playful quips and sort of meddling ways that are more endearing than they are meddling, and he feels alive.
A/N: I've come to realize that I am not good at endings.
Can You Feel My Heart Again?
Sometimes he forgets how human Natasha is.
Not because she doesn't act it—God, he's never felt more alive, honestly, than when he's with her, and maybe that's why he's felt like this part of him was missing after they parted ways in D.C. last year. Nothing was entirely right in the years following New York, and he tried to fall back into what he knew – tried turning himself into a soldier for S.H.I.E.L.D. – but whenever he was with Natasha, things came really close to feeling okay—like he's where he's supposed to be. He knows she can't see it for herself, but Natasha is the most vibrant person he's ever known. She comes into his life with her little grins and playful quips and sort of meddling ways that are more endearing than they are meddling, and he feels alive.
Maybe that's the problem. He's depended so much on her to mend himself that he'd forgotten that she's still capable of being hurt.
"What happened?"
His voice barely makes it out of his throat, because he's staring at Natasha and the blood beneath her, staining the ground. Her eyes are closed and her face is pale and her hair is sticking to her face with sweat and dirt.
"She – saved me," Sam says quietly. Her head is in his lap and he looks up at Steve with this pained, knowing expression. His tone is quiet, almost guilty, and Steve runs a hand over his face. Sam knows what Natasha means to Steve, probably figured it out before Steve could for himself. Of course he'd be worried about Steve getting mad over this.
He drops to his knees beside them, squeezing Sam's shoulder – I'm glad you're alright, he means, and Sam nods faintly – before looking to the woman hovering over Natasha.
Jemma, he thinks her name is—someone who works with Coulson, who's still alive.
(It feels like some higher force is playing with him, seeing how many things can be thrown at Steve at once before he breaks.)
(He looks at Natasha on the ground, at the gash running down her side, swollen and bleeding, and thinks that this may be that breaking point.)
"We need to stitch her up right now, before she loses too much blood," Jemma says, and though Steve only just got here, she seems to be directing this at him, like she knows he needs to hear this the most. "It'll buy us enough time to get her to a hospital that hasn't been hit so she can be properly treated, but we can't move her until she's patched."
Steve swallows and nods, about to ask what the hell they're waiting for, when Sharon stumbles to the ground beside them, thrusting a first-aid kit out. She must've taken it out of a downed ambulance nearby, Steve guesses, mostly to keep his thoughts straight when he sees the needle and thread inside. Jemma uncaps a bottle of antiseptic and pours it over the cloth she rips from its packaging, and when she looks at Steve, he sees her expression – still collected, but a little uneasy – and already knows the order she's about to give him.
"I'll need you to hold her down," she tells him. She'll be in pain, is implied, but not dared spoken.
Steve nods again, looking over at Natasha, whose eyelids flutter open as she rolls her head gently to meet his gaze. He leans forward and grasps her shoulders, pressing his thumb into her skin through the material of her suit.
"You got me?" she asks. Her voice is soft and hoarse, but in this moment, it's the most beautiful thing he's ever heard.
"Yeah, Nat," he breathes out. "Yeah, you know I've got you."
Jemma presses the cloth over her cut and Natasha gasps a little, body tensing. Steve's eyes snap onto Jemma, who mutters apologies under her breath as she works to clean her cut of shards and dirt, and it's ridiculous that this woman thinks she needs to apologize in the first place. Steve can't really get the words out of him, though, so he turns to Natasha again. He can tell that she's trying not to, but she's shifting, body automatically flinching away from the sting of the antiseptic and instruments prying debris from her open wound.
Then Jemma picks up the needle and works the thread into place, and Steve grips Natasha's shoulders a little tighter when she murmurs, "God, I hate those things."
He lets out a breathy, strained laugh. "You're going to have to suck it up, then."
Her lips twitch, an amused expression gracing her face, but then her lips part and her eyes squeeze shut and she lets out this little whimper as Jemma punctures her skin, and Steve presses her down as her body tries to coil away.
"You're going to be alright," he says, because it's true and they both need to hear it. She's in pain, but she's going to live through this. She can take this.
Her jaw is flexing, trying to swallow her screams, but these little gasps and mewls manage to find their way out and they claw at him from within. He wishes he could take the pain from her or ease it somehow, but he can't and he hates it. He wants it to be over with faster, but he doesn't want to rush Jemma, either, knowing he'd rather her take her time to than risk something going wrong. His stomach turns uneasily at every little whimper from Natasha, at her stuttering gasps for breath, and when she lets out a yelp at something particularly painful, it's automatic, the way his hands come up to cradle her face. Sam grasps her shoulders to keep her down and Steve strokes his thumbs gently over her cheeks.
"Natasha, look at me," he murmurs – pleads – and her eyelids flutter open. "There, that's it," he whispers. "Just look at me."
Her body is still tense, trying to fight off the pain, but her expression softens a little, and her lips actually curl into a faint but bright smile as she breathes his name, like all she needs in this moment is to see him.
(And he thinks that maybe – maybe she might depend on him like he depends on her.)
Jemma tugs sharply, trying to close the widest part of the cut, and Natasha whimpers, her hand grasping onto the sleeve of his suit so she can dig her fingers into him.
"I'm sorry, I know, I know it hurts," he rushes out. He draws himself closer and her eyes shine with tears he knows she'll be damned if she sheds.
It's almost enough to make him laugh – his proud, stubborn Natasha.
He lifts a hand from her face, threading his fingers through her hair, and she leans into his palm. She bites down on her lower lip, trying to hold in her breath, hold in the pain, and he runs his thumb over her lips to part them every time, making her gasp. She shoots him a look of annoyance and some part of him is amused by this, but he's sure as hell not going to let her get away with it. He hates that she's in any pain at all, but she's allowed to feel it without feeling weak. If she needs a little help to get through it then he's going to give it.
Finally, finally, Jemma snaps off the end of the thread and sits on the backs of her ankles.
"It's done," she breathes.
Steve reaches over to squeeze Jemma's shoulder. "Thank you," he says, hoping she can feel the weight of his words. She nods, smiling brightly – humble but triumphant, Steve realizes – and then hands him a rag, and he uses it to start dabbing at the sweat on Natasha's face.
Jemma starts talking again after a moment, telling Sharon that they need to find a way to transport Natasha and to get a hold of the others, but he isn't paying attention anymore.
Natasha is sort of just staring up at the sky with heavy eyes, her chest rising and falling as her breaths start to even out, and Steve smiles – his brave Natasha.
He needs her, he thinks, gently pressing the cloth against her cheek.
The realization settles into his head so calmly that he's sure he's must've known this for a while now, how much he can't live without her. He thinks about the months that followed Washington D.C. and about the emptiness in his heart that seemed to be getting a little wider with each day. He knows part of it was because of what had happened – taking down shield, leaving him without a solid purpose, without that solid and familiar structure he'd been trying to get back – and because of Bucky – the thought of his best friend, tormented and alone, wandering the world with less of a purpose than himself and not a clue of who he really is, pressing its way into Steve's heart, urging him to look faster and try harder.
But he knows that emptiness also had to do with Natasha, and with the thought of not knowing when he'd see her again.
It's not as though they'd spent all of their time when he started for S.H.I.E.L.D. after New York. There were sometimes days at a time where they wouldn't see each other, their assignments throwing their schedules out of sync.
She was always with him, though. He'd order cuisine in some foreign country and picture her making a face at his plate, stabbing at the food with her fork, telling him that next time he needs to order something she wants to try, too. He'd make his way over to Nick's office for debriefing and wonder if he'd cross her path for a few minutes. And it seems like they managed to squeeze in time together – an early morning gym session, a trip over to the diner for milkshakes, a lazy evening on the couch with takeout and his Netflix queued up.
Every country he and Sam visited, he imagined running into her there, imagined what kind of cover she might be in the middle of discovering. Every dead end or false lead they came across, he could hear her voice in his head, telling him to suck it up and keep going.
He needs her, and he came close to losing her today.
His fingers curl tighter around the cloth and she tilts her head to look at him, eyebrows furrowing a little in an unspoken question.
"Natasha, I…" The words aren't quite forming, and he lets out a breath. "I never did get around to calling that nurse."
Her eyes widen a little, glancing at Sharon – distracted by her conversation with Jemma as the two of them attempt to contact the others – before meeting his gaze again, and he watches the understanding settle as she hears the real meaning to his words.
"I wanted to call you but – I didn't want to bother you."
"I thought you were enough of a gentleman to not keep a girl waiting," she says, and he lets out a breath. "You could never bother me, Steve," she adds, voice softer, gentle.
He laughs – this quick, breathy sound, full of relief – and she squeezes his arm a little tighter.
"Can I bother you for breakfast sometime?" he asks.
She her eyelids flutter closed, and her smile looks as relieved as he feels as she nods, faintly at first, and then opens her eyes to look into his as she says, "I'd love that."