Moments. That's all it takes to change everything. Not even moments anymore. A heartbeat, a wrong step in a direction. A wrong foot placement. Everything can be over in a blink of an eye. A history-making sports play, a friendship, a car wreck, a person's life. Anything, and everything, done and over in a lifechanging moment.
It's been nearly six years since I've met the love of my life. The one person that knows how I feel. The one who can handle me during panic attacks, nightmares and even when I get too overprotective for my own good. She gets where I'm coming from, she understands how I never really got over what I used to have. But she still loves me no matter what. Natasha. My Natasha.
It was her stubbornness, which was the best way to describe it, for all the things to spiral downward. And she knew it was too, right from the start. She'd always been too stubborn for her own good, everyone knew it. Anyone that had ever met her knew it. Natasha Romanoff was not one to listen to someone when she had her mind set on something.
A mission in Romania, that's what did it. And the worse thing was the fact that I should have been able to stop it from happening. If I had held her a bit longer, kept her in my arms instead of letting her go out, on her own, without me, it wouldn't have happened. She was my responsibility, my personal problem but she never was a true problem. She was the exact opposite in fact. She was more of a blessing than anything, and she was all mine.
But Romania, it was ours. We went a handful of times before it was all said and done. When we weren't doing something with the mission, when we could relax, we did everything and anything that we could. We tried everything, new food, the beaches, anything really that we could do, we did.
Two times, two times it had snowed, and I had never seen her act the way she did. In New York, sure, it snowed, and yes, it was amazing, but something was different. In New York, she was so worried someone would see her. Ruin her "tough image", if she still had it after all we'd done. In Romania though, it was amazing. She was laughing and smiling, refusing to come in. My favorite was when she wouldn't come in. Her cheeks and nose would be bright red, her eyelashes and hair sprinkled with the snowflakes. And it was so perfect.
When she finally would come in, we'd just sit in front of the fire and I'd hold her tight in my arms. That's it. Even if we sat in complete silence, it was okay. Because she was safe in my arms and she okay. That's all we needed.
The second time it snowed though, it was as great. It started off as normal as it could possibly be though it definitely didn't end that way. She'd left before I had, which for this mission, it was completely normal. But something was off, and I knew she felt it too. She stayed in my arms longer than normal, and almost turned back when she stepped out of the room. And I wish I had grabbed her wrist, pulled her back in and kept her there all day. But I didn't. And I hate myself for that fact.
She got found out, a mole, somebody ruined her cover. She got hit around, a good bit before getting knocked in the head with a pipe or something along those lines. She was then thrown out into the freezing cold, in the snow, left to die before she could even try to fight back. She laid out in the snow for hours, unconscious. I wasn't even the one that found her, someone else did. Some random passerby was the one who did, and pitied her, and took her to the hospital. The whole time I was on the other side of the site, waiting, for orders that never came.
The call I got was heart-wrenching and it was the longest, most drawn out call I had ever been a part of. 'Gather your things. The jet will be there in ten. Natasha's down.' So simple, so few of words, yet so harmful, so gut twisting.
By the time I was on the jet, they had her connected to so many wires and tubes, it scared me. I'm the one to protect her, I should have, but instead I sat there as she laid dead still on a stretcher beside me. Her heart still beating, as slow as it could, her chest never rising to show she was alive. I'd seen her bad before, gun shots and stab wounds, bruises and blood, but never like this. She was so vulnerable, that's the best way to describe it. Like she depended on everyone for what she needed and it was weird for me. She was strong, never really asking for any help, and there she was, almost begging as she lay unconscious.
By the time we got to base, they had already rushed her out of the quinjet as soon as they landed, even before I could stand up myself. I knew that something bad was going on at that moment, and I knew it was worse they wouldn't let me go be with her.
Her brain had swollen up, badly, and it had pushed against her skull hard, bruising it. They kept her in a comatose state for nearly a week, and every moment of that time, I'd been beside her, holding onto her hand, just hoping for her to wrap her small fingers around mine like she always did.
They told me that things may be fuzzy, her brain still not having gone down to normal size from the swelling. She may forget a few bits and pieces but other than that, everything would be okay. I didn't know and entire base of doctors could be so wrong.