Heeey...so, remember that time I thought I'd get a one-shot out in January? Or February? Yeah, me too.
So what happened? Short answer-college. Long answer...if you really want the long answer, PM me.
But, hey, I'm back with the first of my "Lone Wolf" trio of oneshots, aka, the oneshots that fit in further back in my 'Verse, and stand on their own.
This one is set chronologically first in the ChristyVerse, before We Can Be Found, in June/July 2012 (right after The Avengers). It gives a little bit more backstory for Christy as well.
Honestly, this story is really just my ode to living/what happens when you listen to a Hamilton song with superheroes on the brain. And I hope you enjoy.
Wait for It
"You don't have to leave, you know."
Steve glanced over his shoulder and found Natasha striding towards him with her typical catlike grace. It was after ten p.m., but the city lights made it seem as bright as day on the roof of the newly-christened Avengers' Tower.
He had stolen away here to think over his upcoming motorcycle trip plans, hoping he was being stealthy about it.
Apparently not.
"Pardon?" he asked politely, though of course he'd heard every word.
Natasha eased herself down next to him. "I said you don't have to go. You know Stark's opening up the Tower."
Steve shrugged. "I know. But what am I gonna do around here?"
"Catch up on technology?"
Steve made a face.
"Kidding." Natasha leaned forward conspiratorially. "You're actually doing fine with tech stuff. Don't let Stark make you feel incompetent—his brain goes so fast, he might as well be half-computer."
Steve gave a tiny smirk. "Yeah…just like…" his face fell.
"Just like his dad?" Natasha questioned.
Steve nodded, short and terse. "Yeah. Like Howard. Like…" he stopped abruptly. The muscle in his jaw twitched once, twice, three times, before growing smooth. His chest hitched in and out.
"You're allowed to mourn." Natasha said quietly.
Steve stood up suddenly and swung his fist in the air. "Dammit! I know! But there's…there's too many! I can't just cry for the rest of my life. I have to do something, be something, be the guy they thought I could and was and…dammit, why didn't I just die?"
Those words hung in the air, despairing yet oddly healing.
Because frankly, it was what Steve had been wondering for nearly a year, ever since he'd been found and thawed.
Why didn't I just die?
He gave Natasha a very bad imitation of a smile. "I didn't mean that."
"Yes, you did." Natasha said calmly.
There was silence. Steve ran a hand through his hair.
"Alright, so maybe I meant it." he whispered. "But…can ya blame a fella? You don't need me; nobody needs me. You've got Stark. He's a perfectly fine leader for the Avengers."
"I didn't see Stark giving orders in the last battle." Natasha argued. "And I didn't see Stark take one look at Barton, a guy you only knew as having been brainwashed by Loki, and tell him to suit up, no questions asked."
Steve shrugged. "Anyone could've done that."
"But you're the one who did."
The gratefulness in Natasha's voice was obvious.
"He was sent to kill me…" she murmured. "But he made a different call. He was the first person to look at me like I was worth more than how many missions I had to my name. Anyone who cares about him…"
She left the thought unfinished, her meaning clear.
"Well, I didn't see any good reason not to trust him." Steve said. "And I definitely don't now. Barton's a swell guy. He's, ah, been a real help. For me, I mean."
Natasha gave the tiniest of smiles. "Say 'decent'. Or 'good'. Or 'solid'. Not 'swell"."
Steve nodded. "Right, right. I'll remember." He gave a weary sigh. "Guess I need to start a list. 'Idiot's Guide to Surviving the 21st Century.'"
"I'd be willing to help." Natasha said, poker faced.
"Sure, I'll let ya know when I need contributions."
They lapsed into quiet for a moment.
"Why'd you come up here anyway?" Steve asked finally.
Natasha stretched lazily and shrugged. "I saw you come up, didn't think you should be alone."
"I'm not gonna jump." Steve muttered sourly, gesturing off the building's edge.
"You're the one who asked why you didn't just die."
Steve frowned, but at last nodded in concession. "Fair." He faced her head on. "Do you know how many letters I've sent, how many people I've tried to find, only to get a…a "Dear Captain Rogers, we're so sorry to inform you" reply? Everyone, Romanoff, everyone is dead or almost there! And I'm still the same stupid twenty-six-year-old that crashed a plane into the Atlantic to save a world that's just as messed up as when I left, and…"
He hung his head.
"You're not the only one who's had to start all over." Natasha whispered.
Steve gave a half-hearted glare. "Yeah, but you chose that. I didn't ask to get…resurrected."
"No, you didn't." Natasha leaned forward. "But you did. Now it's up to you to decide if you think there's a reason for it."
Steve stared. "You mean…like fate, or God, or something?"
"Maybe. Or something you're supposed to do. Someone you're supposed to meet or save or help. You never know. Question is…are you willing to wait for it? Or are you going to assume that you coming back from the ice was just a fluke?"
Steve felt blindsided. What on earth could he say to that?
"Whether you think so or not, we do need you." Natasha added. "For a leader…and for a friend. You're not a copy, Rogers…frankly, you're one of a dying breed. A dying breed that the world really needs right now."
Steve snorted. "What's so special about me?"
"Not that many guys would jump on a grenade to save people that had been mocking them for weeks on end."
Steve shot her a look. "How'd you know about that?"
Natasha smirked. "It was in your file. Look, all I'm saying is, you have no idea what's coming next. Are you gonna gamble on the world not needing you…or are you going to stick around and see if it does?"
She stood up. "Think about it." she said, walking back into the Tower.
Once more, Steve was left alone with his thoughts. But now, his cross-country travel plans were the last thing on his mind.
If there's some reason that I'm here, when everyone and everything I knew is gone…
Am I willing to wait for it?
"I've been waiting for a year." he mumbled bitterly. "I still feel out of place."
Wait for it, a voice sounded in his mind. Wait for it, wait for it…
"But don't even know what I'm waiting for!" he griped back. "Or how long it'll take. And maybe whatever or whoever it is will need Captain America, and not me. Nobody seems to need Steve Rogers anymore."
Wait for it…
Steve sighed as those three words ran around in his brain on a seemingly endless loop.
"Alright." he whispered, staring up at the night sky. "If there is some reason that I'm here, that I'm alive, when everyone…" his voice cracked, "Everyone who loved me is dead or dying…I'm willing to wait for it. I promise."
With those words, the heavy weight that he'd carried for almost a year seemed to grow less.
For better or worse, he was alive. This strange, alien century was now his home.
Even if he wasn't quite sure what his purpose was, he was willing to take the gamble that he had one.
And until he figured it out, he would wait for it.
Olivia Darrow took a deep breath and bent down in front of the skinny, blonde seven-year-old, who was currently sitting in an uncomfortable hospital chair with her legs tucked against her chest and her head buried in her knees.
"Crystal, honey? Can you look at me?"
Slowly, a face lifted, revealing dark tear-stain patches on the knees Christy's jeans.
"Oh, baby…" Olivia bit her tongue to keep from uttering the infamous 'it'll be okay'. That would be the worst and least helpful thing to say right now.
"Have you eaten anything?" she asked instead.
Christy shook her head. "Not hungry. I tried to eat and I threw up."
Olivia shook her head and sat down next to the distraught child.
Ever since she'd been assigned to Christy Allen's case, she'd been continually surprised by the girl's generally optimistic and upbeat demeanor. But now that her mom had succumbed to the cancer…
And she has no family. None. Father already dead, no grandparents or close relatives, at least that I can find…she and her mom might as well have dropped out of the sky!
She sighed. She'd had a lot of difficult cases but Christy's was difficult in an entirely separate way.
What seven-year-old deserves to be left entirely alone in the world?
She gripped Christy's shoulder. "You'll need to eat eventually, honey, but I guess it's alright to wait. Have you already… finished everything here?"
Christy nodded. "I said goodbye to Mommy and then the nurse took me here." she whispered.
"Alright. Well, sweetie, if you're ready, I can take you over to the Center. I talked to them earlier, so they know you're coming."
"Okay. Do…do they have books at the Center?"
The tone was so desperate, Olivia's heart nearly cracked in two. "Yes, honey, they have books."
Christy nodded again and stood up. "Okay. If they have books, I'll be okay."
Olivia smiled and took the girl's hand. "Come on, then. My car's right outside. Before I drop you off…" she cast about desperately for something, anything, "could you eat ice cream?"
Christy froze and, too late, Olivia remembered the girl telling her that one of her favorite things to do was get ice cream with her mom.
"I'm so sorry, sweetie…"
"N-no, thank you." Christy said, her voice wobbling. "I…I'm really not hungry."
Olivia nodded and started to walk out of the hospital, before she could commit any more blunders.
Christy sat on a bench in the Center's play courtyard, watching the other children run around. On her lap were three battered, paperback American Girl books, one open.
It had been a couple of days, but Christy still didn't feel comfortable here. Miss Emily, her new room mom, was nice, and the other girls were trying to be nice, but…
It's not home and Miss Emily's not Mom.
"I wanna go home…" she said quietly, staring blankly at the open book. The words swam in front of her like tiny black ants.
I don't have one.
The thought slammed into her with all the force of a pitched baseball.
I don't have a home. I don't have anything. I could disappear right now and nobody would…
"Hello."
Christy's dark thoughts came to a screeching halt at the sound of another girl's voice. She looked up.
The girl was a little bit taller than her, with thick hair pulled back into two braids. Her skin was dark brown and her eyes even darker. She was smiling, but it wasn't a fake smile like the ones the other girls gave her. It was a soft smile—not flashy or overbearing.
"I'm Tally." the girl said. "Well, really I'm Natalie but everybody calls me Tally. What's your name?"
Christy glanced down and scuffed her shoes. "I'm Christy."
Tally looked over at the books on Christy's lap. "What're you reading?"
Christy flinched and moved to cover the books. She hated that question. But Tally was quicker than her and had already seen the covers.
"I like American Girl books, too." she said. "My last house had a bunch."
Christy unclenched herself, curious. "H-have you been in a lot of houses?"
Tally shrugged and sat down on the bench. "I used to live with my mom, but she…she couldn't do things right. Sometimes there wasn't food in the fridge, and sometimes weird people would come over…never mind. So the CPC people came, and then I lived with my grandma. She was great, but she…she's old and doesn't have a lot of money, so she couldn't take care of me good. Then I went to the Dawson's house, and they were okay, but they had to move and couldn't take me. So now I'm back here."
Christy's already wide eyes got even wider "I-I'm sorry. I hope somebody nice comes and takes you."
Tally smiled a little. "Me too. I like houses better than Centers. This one is good, but…" she bit her lip. "I miss my Grandma's house. Sometimes I miss the Dawson's house."
Christy tucked her legs up and whispered, "My mom died last week."
Tally frowned. "I'm sorry."
"I don't have a grandma. Or a dad, 'cause he died when I was little. Or anybody. It was just us. And now I'm scared, 'cause that didn't matter but now it does and I don't think anyone will want me…" she stopped, her chest hitching in and out, and her mouth wide open as if gasping for air.
Tally gingerly reached out her arm and pulled Christy against her side. "I-I think somebody will want you." She paused and finally added, "I want you."
Christy's mouth shut at that, though she was still breathing erratically.
"Do…do you wanna be friends? Then we can want each other, even if nobody else does."
Christy nodded slowly. "I never had a best friend before. I just played with everybody at school. But you're nice."
Tally looked guilty. "Sometimes I think too much. Or I don't wanna talk, and then I get mad if people make me."
"That's okay. My mom says…" there was only the slightest catch of breath as Christy realized her mistake. "S-said that I talk enough for everybody. Since she d-died, I haven't felt like talking much."
Tally nodded. "That's okay. I don't mind quiet."
Christy flipped over her open book. "You wanna read? Together?"
"Okay."
Christy pointed at the page. "I stopped here, I think. It's a Samantha book, and she just met her friend."
Tally found the sentence. "Okay. I'll start here. When I finish…" she moved her finger down about a paragraph's length, "this much, you can start? Okay?"
"Okay!"
Feeling calmer than she had in a long time, Christy sat back and listened to Tally's voice read the story.
Maybe this place isn't so bad after all…
Tally woke up out of a deep sleep and rolled over in bed. For a minute, she lay still, blinking into the dark and listening to the faint sounds of the other girls snoring.
And then she realized something strange about the bed next to her; Christy's bed.
Namely, that Christy wasn't in it.
With a jolt of shock, she quietly rolled out of bed and tried to look around the dark room. No Christy. She tiptoed over to the door and peeked out.
Sure enough, Christy was sitting in the hallway, where the staircase down to the main area and the dining hall was. There was one lone window that looked out into the street and she was crouched in front of it.
Tally crept closer. "Christy!" she hissed. "You're supposed to be in bed."
Christy shrugged. "Couldn't sleep."
"Then why didn't you get Miss Emily?"
"Why should I wake her up? I just wanted to look out the window. I thought if I could look at the stars, I would get sleepy."
Tally sighed and sat down beside her friend. She was growing used to Christy's odd trains of thought.
"So why can't you sleep?" she asked.
Christy's gaze broke off from out the window. "I keep thinking about Mom. I keep waking up and thinking everything will be a dream. And then it's not."
Tally bit her lip. "You stop doing that. After a while."
"Yeah. And then I think…" Christy trailed off. "You're gonna think I'm stupid."
"I won't! Promise."
"I think about why I'm not dead." At Tally's poker face expression, Christy hastened to explain. "I mean, it was just me and Mom, now it's just me. She…she said I was her good thing, her happy thing, 'cause she didn't have a lot of happy things when Dad died. So now I wonder if I'm supposed to be someone else's good thing."
Tally still looked a little dumbfounded.
"I told you it was stupid."
Tally shook her head. "No…that's not stupid. I dunno what it is, but it's not stupid. It's… pretty. Like a story."
"Guess so. But now I really can't sleep."
Tally gave a world-weary "mom sigh". "Do you want a lullaby again?"
It had taken her a grand total of one day to figure out that the quickest way to cheer Christy up involved singing.
"Maybe…"
"Okay. But you gotta come back to bed!"
With one final look out the window, Christy got up and followed Tally back into the bedroom.
"I'm gonna sing quiet, okay?" Tally said. She sat on the side edge of Christy's bed as Christy tucked herself under the sheet and blanket. "You gotta sleep."
"I will…" Christy mumbled. "Promise. But Tally?"
"Yeah?"
"You said what I was thinking about wasn't stupid…so do you think it's right? That I'm gonna be somebody else's good thing?"
Tally shrugged. "I dunno why not. You're my good thing right now."
Christy leaned over and gave Tally a hug. "You're mine, too."
Tally couldn't stop her smile but she was still determined to be the sensible one. "Okay, okay; you need to sleep. Shush!"
Christy lay down and Tally started to sing in a low, quiet voice. The words and music drifted over Christy like a magic spell, luring her into a state calm enough to fall asleep.
But as she did, one thought stayed in her head.
Gonna be a…good thing, good thing, somebody's good thing…
She was still lonely sometimes. And she still missed her mom.
But maybe the reason she was still here was because somebody else needed a good thing. And if that was true, she couldn't wait to find out who that somebody was.
Moral of the story, guys...you never know what life is going to bring you next. You are valuable, important, and have something to accomplish in life. Never, ever feel like you aren't needed. You're alive for a reason, I promise. And if you don't know that reason...wait for it. Please. It'll come.
Anyway, that's that. One one-shot down, two to go. I think my next one is going to be a little number called "Alas, Thou Hast Misconstrued Everything!" in which Thor desperately attempts to set the record straight on a certain Norse Myth, and Loki is not helping at all...going back to those two is gonna be fun.
I can't make any promises for when it'll be out, but this coming week is Spring Break, so I might actually get to write! Until then...
Reviews are wonderful things...