So, this isn't a Romanogers story, but I guess it could be considered that. I decided to write this, because this topic is very dear and close to my heart. Only recently have I started realizing different things, and my relationship with God has started changing.
I never really used to understand God because of the way I was brought up, but I've started going to this Church, and it's really changed my life for the better. I got friends, which I have honestly never had before, and I started understanding my place in the world. So, enough rambling from me; here's the story! :)
Disclaimer: I unfortunately don't own this... *sniffle*
Natasha screamed as she bolted upright in bed. Her eyes darted around wildly until she recognized what room she was in. She sighed and buried her face in her hands, ignoring the tears that streamed down her cheeks.
Another nightmare had woken her up, and she knew there would be no use trying to get back to sleep. And right about now she pretty was thankful for Tony giving them all sound-proof rooms. Ever since a mission with the Avengers in Russia, she was having two to three awful nightmares every night.
She sighed again as she threw the covers off of her lithe frame, and headed out into the dark hallway silently. She ran a hand through her tangled hair and walked out into the living room, startling her, but she didn't show it, when she saw a dark figure in the living room.
She immediately went into an attack position, but as she got closer, she noticed that the figure wasn't an intruder at all; it was Steve.
He was sitting on the floor in front of the window, his head bowed as his mouth moved silently. His eyes were closed and a big book was open on his lap.
He murmured one last word, before his head started coming up. She immediately started to leave the room, when his voice stopped her.
"I know you're there, Natasha." He whispered, and she froze, before slowly turning around. He wasn't even looking at her, instead he was just staring out the window.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to bother you." She said, and he shook his head lightly with a small smile; still not looking at her.
"You didn't bother me." He said as he finally did glance up at her, he motioned with his hand for her to come over, and she hesitantly obeyed.
Once she did get over there, he pointed out the window, and a small gasp escaped her lips. The usually busy and blaring city that she was used to, was now quiet, an orange and pink glow layering it.
"It's beautiful," She said breathlessly, and Steve nodded with a smile.
"It's my favorite time of day." He stated as she continued to look out the floor to ceiling window in awe. They sat there for a while in a silent comfort, before Steve spoke up.
And if she didn't have really good hearing, she wouldn't have heard the question. "Nightmares?" He asked quietly, and she looked down; feeling his gaze on her. She nodded wordlessly as she continued to look at the floor.
"Me too," He whispered, and she glanced up at him to find him looking back out the window.
"It's why I'm down here, could never sleep at this time of day for some reason. Always got woken up by nightmares. So, I would come down here, watch the sun come up, and read."
He looked back down at the book, that she suddenly realized was the Bible. For some reason just the sight of it made her slightly uncomfortable. She nodded once, slowly, and sighed.
"It must be nice to be able to believe in fairytales." She whispered as she looked out the window again, and feeling Steve's gaze bore into her again.
"It's not a fairytale, Natasha." Steve declared. Not anger in his voice, but just, determination. She nodded.
"Yeah. But how can you believe in something so...so frivolous? What's it like to put all your faith and hope into one single thing?"
"I mean, how can a person be so naive in order to actually in believe something like that?" She asked, voice getting louder towards the end as she spoke out all her hidden, and unanswered questions that she had always wondered about.
The Red Room had always banned any Bibles or talk about religion from the Rooms. She had always wondered if her birth parents had any sort of religion, but then again they lived in Russia so it was highly improbable. She remembered talking about Christianity once with Clint.
"Clint?" A 25 year old Natasha asked as she sat at the table in his home as he walked about the kitchen, holding a young Lila in his arms and talking softly to her. He turned around and faced her.
"Yeah, 'Tasha?" He questioned before taking a drink of his coffee. She inhaled once before speaking.
"Do you believe in God?" She asked bluntly, never being one to beat around the bush. He paused a moment, not at all taken aback by her question, before nodding slowly and taking another drink of his coffee.
"I do. I like to believe that there's someone up there, watching over my family." He stated as he leaned up against the counter.
"But what about you?" She questioned and he sighed as he rubbed a hand over his face.
"I don't know. I know He does watch my back when we're in the field, otherwise I wouldn't be standing here today, holding a miracle directly from Him." He said as he bounced Lila lightly, making her giggle.
"Do you pray?" She asked.
"I do. Sometimes. I know that Laura does whenever we're called in for a mission. I guess I like to think of God as a comfort, and close friend. He's important to me, and I know that I should spend more time reading the Bible, but I struggle with it. I mean, there's just so much to do and so little time to do it." He paused again.
"But I do believe in Him. Without Him I wouldn't have the amazing family and life I do today." He declared and she nodded slowly, still processing all of the information she had been banned from knowing about.
"Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go put this little one to bed." He said and Lila declared a proud 'no'. Clint laughed and nodded. "Oh, yes I do." He said and Lila shook her head, so Clint immediately started tickling her little stomach. Lila giggled, and finally nodded. "Good girl."
She came back to reality when Steve started speaking again.
"It's not frivolous, Natasha, it's real, and it's amazing to be able to have something so incredible. It's an amazing feeling to be able to connect with God, and put all your hope in Him. And it doesn't make a person naive to believe in something like this." He answered each of her questions with understanding and calmness.
He sighed before looking over at her once, and then down at the Bible. "I used to have nightmares every night. Every night I'd wake up screaming from something that had me trapped in my own mind." She looked down, feeling a pit of unease in her stomach.
"But ever since I've come back to God, and started reading the Bible and praying, they've stopped considerably. I hardly ever have them, just after missions most of the time." She nodded slowly again, slightly confused.
"You said, when you came back to God?" She questioned quietly and he sighed and nodded again.
"Yeah, after the ice, I sort of, strayed away from God; confused and hurt as to why He would bring me back from the ice in a world that makes no sense. I guess, I was angry. I was angry and I felt betrayed by Him."
"But I guess, it started before that even. Through my childhood, I was taught by my mother about Christ and Christianity, and every once in a while, when we could, we'd go to a small Church. But then she..." He paused and swallowed.
"She died. And I felt hurt by that, I mean, why would God allow her to die and spare me? Eventually I got over it, and then Bucky got shipped out to the War and I became Captain America. But then Bucky died."
"And it was my fault. And I started feeling that anger and hatred, and betrayal I did when my mother died. I started questioning my beliefs, and started wondering if such a thing did exist." He frowned with a sigh and she watched on, soaking up every word of it.
"But I started drifting away from God, and the ice was the final straw. I still partially believed He existed, but then with everything that happened when I came back from the ice, I mean, aliens, and gods, and finding out that my own best friend that died at my hands became an assassin for an enemy I sacrificed everything for," He shook his head with his eyes closed.
"It was too much. Then a few months ago, I saw this Bible in a library, and I just felt drawn towards it. Like it was calling for me, and ever since then, I've found peace with the Lord. I'm no longer angry or hurt, I don't understand sometimes, but I'm not angry."
"And I know that He's happy I came back, and that's He's not angry at me for it." He opened his eyes and looked over at her, compassion shining in through his azure colored eyes. She suddenly felt like all the wind in her was knocked out and she was left to pick up the pieces.
Tears pricked the back of her eyes as she looked down, fingers aimlessly playing with the end of her shirt.
"But you're Captain America, you've never sinned other than that, you didn't kill thousands of innocent people." She stated.
"Natasha, believe me, I've sinned numerous of times, more than I can even count. But that doesn't mean God won't accept me. Won't accept you." He said and she swallowed hard.
"In the Red Room, we were taught that any so called god, out there, was fake, all we needed to focus on was our mission. To complete our mission." She slowly shook her head.
"And when we didn't, we'd get punished; severely. I remember one girl, she was a Christian, and she stood up for what she believed in."
"She said there was only one God, and that He didn't want any of us to do this, and that He loved us, we just had to stand up for each other. She was the sweetest and kindest girl I had ever met." She sighed and bit her lip hard.
"They drug her away to some room. She didn't come back out." She whispered the brutal truth with closed eyes.
"And I see all these others, like Lila, and I don't want that to happen to her. I don't want someone taking her and ripping her innocence from her and turning her into a killing machine...like me."
Her voice broke and she looked down, choking on a sob. Steve's hand landed softly on her shoulder as tears streamed down her cheeks.
"There's no way God would ever want something to do with me, I-I'm too far gone. Too damaged and broken. I'm not worth the trouble of being put back together." She choked on another sob, and Steve's arms were around her in an instant, calming her as she cried onto his shoulder.
"Shh, shh." He soothed. She cried silently, but hard; releasing all of the pent up pain from over the years. She pulled back from his arms and looked up at him.
"Is it possible that...He does exist?" She asked quietly, feeling the logical side of her scold herself for being so stupid, but she also felt a new one, an inner voice telling her it was okay to ask such a thing. Steve nodded.
"Yeah, Natasha. It is. Miracles do happen." She nodded slowly at his words, absorbing them rather than letting them bounce off of her.
"But is it possible for Him to ever...accept me? I mean, why would He ever want someone like me? I hide behind masks, I-I don't even know who I am anymore after all the pretending." She shook her head slowly, feeling a desperate struggle taking place within.
"Of course He still wants you, Natasha. God loves you. And He knows you've lost yourself, and I know that He only wants to bring the real you back. It's possible, Nat. Trust me." He stated and she sighed as she looked down.
"But I don't even know where to begin, what to do. I've made myself so distant, I don't even know how to pray. It just seems so greedy." She said, voice barely above a whisper. She could see out of the corner of her eyes that Steve was nodding.
"Yeah, I know. It's hard. And prayer does sound greedy; I still struggle with that. But God doesn't want us to struggle, He wants us to admit our pain and repent."
"It can be hard to have faith sometimes, but God already knows what's in our hearts, we just need to accept that and open ourselves up to Him. And about not knowing where to begin," He paused and took her hand in his. "I'll teach you." He whispered and she looked up, shock settling in her irises.
"Really?" She questioned and he nodded with a small smile.
"Yeah. I'll do anything to bring you back." A small smile graced her lips as she wrapped her arms around him in a hug, and finally, felt at peace with her life. It wasn't going to be easy. She was sure of that.
But at least she'd have a good friend by her side through it all, and that she'd finally be on the right path. She smiled as a warm and comforting feeling settled in her heart.
"Thank you, Steve." She whispered, and realized that the sun was almost entirely up by now. She knew that Steve was smiling, as he spoke genuinely.
"Anytime, Nat. Anytime." He said, and for the first time in her whole life, she couldn't wait for the rest of the day. Because God existed, and was giving her a second chance.
And that was all that mattered.
So, please review and let me know what you think, I always love hearing your guy's thoughts! And if you ever need to talk, or discuss things with me, or if you have any questions, please feel free to PM me; I'll always listen. And if you're going through a rough time, just please remember that God loves you. I know that it's hard to believe that sometimes, trust me, I know, but He really does. :)