passage of time
He slides next to her on the bench overlooking the lake. She closes her eyes and tips her head back, letting the sun warm her face in a way it hasn't for years.
"Hi."
"Hey."
She doesn't look at him as she feels him staring at her.
"You look good," he starts.
"Thanks," she smirks, eyes still closed. "I don't look like a pile of dust, so I suppose that's an improvement."
He laughs a bit, before turning serious. "I'm sorry," he says, running a hand through his hair.
"For what?"
"Avoiding you for the last week," he replies regretfully.
"Yeah, I noticed," she says. "But I can chalk that up to all the shit that we've had to deal with."
"You shouldn't. I've been—"
"—it's fine. I get it," she interrupts firmly, eventually turning to him. "With Nat and Tony, and all the things we've had to do to get everything back up and running again. First priority's been—well, literally everything, I guess."
"What exactly have you been doing?" He asks, playing with the soft package next to him.
"What I've always done. Making connections again, overseeing the compound re-building, setting up whoever we have left, working with T'Challa and Okoye to establish strongholds like in Wakanda. There's always something after." She shrugs, "Apparently, once half the world comes back, agencies will do everything they can to track down former deputy directors of specialised intelligence agencies, and whatever the fuck I was when I was working for you lot."
"I would. I'd be recommending you at every chance I got."
"Thanks," she snorts. "As if I didn't have enough to do."
"You could never not do this job," he says, half-amused.
"Which begs the question – I hear you're taking the Stones back?"
"Yeah, Bruce is building a time machine. Again," he says with a rueful smile. "You should have seen what happened the first time. In any case, this is the least I can do right now."
She considers him carefully for a long moment. "You're taking the long way back, aren't you?"
He looks down for a while and swallows before he feels a finger at his chin tilting his head up. "Yeah," he confirms, quiet. "I think I will. How did you know?"
"You've done enough. You've seen enough. And we're both so, so fucking tired," she says, keeping her hand gently against his face. "Maybe there's nothing left for you here. And if you have this chance, once you know it's time to stand down… you've deserved it. We'll be fine here."
His eyes glisten, on the verge. "You deserved better, Maria. I really thought that we could have—before the snap, if we had more time…"
"I deserved what I had in the time that was given. Nothing more and nothing less. I was the right person for our time, for a time," she smiles at him, small and sad.
"Maria—"
"—I trusted you and I knew you and I really, really did like you, too. And almost always, that was more than I could have hoped for in this fucking reality. I think I might have loved you, if we had the time, if we had slightly different circumstances. And I'm glad we had whatever we had. You were a great friend, soldier, agent. And now you have one last job to do," she says, nodding behind him at the machine that Banner is slowly setting up. "And I wouldn't expect anything less, Captain."
He stands and she follows. He leans forward, wrapping his arms tight around her, resting his forehead against hers.
They breathe.
"I won't forget you. Promise."
She laughs, and he can feel it. "You'd better not. I expect the best stories to be told. Even if you have to pass them off as nothing more than a fairytale."
"I'll remember them," he promises in a whisper. "They'll be real."
She stays pressed against him until he lets go and reaches for the loosely wrapped package on the bench.
"Here, this is for you," he says, offering it to her.
She smiles as she unfolds it, fingering the soft worn leather of his jacket. "You don't need it?"
"I don't think so," he shakes his head. "I'm jettisoning most of my things, and it looks better on you, anyway."
The corner of her mouth quirks up slightly. "Sam won't be jealous?"
"Oh, he probably will. But he'll get something better," he says with a gleam in his eye.
"Well, seeing as we're exchanging things… I managed to salvage Nat's notes, and compiled them with Clint's, Rhodey's, and Banner's. There should be enough detail on places, people, and variables," she says, handing him a small, elegant bound notebook with her handwritten script. "From my limited, crash-course understanding of quantum physics and time travel, you can take your time; just make sure everything goes back when and where it should."
He looks over at her with a grin, running his fingers over her neat scrawl. "Always the best mission controller."
"And don't you forget it," she agrees. "One last ride, yeah?"
"One last ride," he exhales, seeing Banner, Bucky, and Sam wave him over.
"I think you're up," she says, gesturing at them. Impulsively, she takes a step forward and embraces him again.
He reciprocates. "You're not coming over?"
"No. I'm good," she says, letting go, stepping back, and giving him a small salute. "All the best, Captain."
He grins back, full and open. "And to you, Commander."
A/N: So, Endgame really made it clear that this is the chronological end of this ship, canonically-speaking, and I wanted just one last scene. (also, I think this is the softest/sappiest I've ever written them, because endings.) But because I'm a sucker for these two, I'm gonna keep writing them, although in the post-Avengers to pre-Infinity War era.