I slipped a small Friends reference in there. See if you can spot it!
This chapter takes place at multiple places during chapters 14-16 of I Know Places (before and during the events of The Winter Soldier).
Something Good
Steve isn't sure when it happened, but since getting romantically involved with Bridget Benson, Natasha Romanov seemed to have subtly slid into the 'best friend' position in his life.
Steve still counts Bridget as his best friend, and also as the love of his life, but Natasha was his best platonic friend. Judging by what he knew of today's society, Steve was pretty sure that a person needed that. To have your partner and your only friend be the same person was pretty limiting and, for the pair of them, lonely when one or the other would be sent out on missions. Bridget had Kate and Darren, who had been her best friends since she was eleven years old, and in the absence of his childhood friend, Natasha seemed to take it upon herself to fill the gap.
"So, I feel like we should be drinking beer and complaining about our love lies," Natasha announced as she sprawled out on the couch in Steve and Bridget's apartment, an entire pizza sitting in the box on her knees. Steve had his own pizza, sitting by his chair, as he tossed Natasha a can of coke on his way back from the kitchen. Bridget was gone on a mission and Steve, not quite used to the loneliness, had invited Natasha round.
"Why?" Steve asked, taking his seat and popping his own can of coke.
Natasha shrugged, picking up a slice of pizza. "Isn't that what guys do when their girlfriend goes out of town?"
Steve shrugged. "I have no idea. If you want to complain about your love life, though, feel free."
Natasha snorted. "What love life? I'm just living vicariously through yours."
That was true. Natasha seemed to have an unnatural interest in Steve and Bridget's relationship. She claimed that the whole set up interested her, but they never managed to get more of an explanation than that.
"So... what's the plan?"
Steve looked at her, blankly. "The plan?"
Natasha nodded, choosing another slice of pizza delicately. "Yeah, the plan. You've been together for, what, two years now? You're still going strong. You've got to have some sort of plan for the future."
Steve shrugged, not looking at Natasha. "I don't think we're the type of people to plan our relationship. We have to plan so much for work and saving the world stuff... We'll just let things go on the way they are. Living in the moment..."
Natasha hummed. "Afraid to ask?"
"Could not be more terrified," Steve confirmed.
"Why are you so scared to ask her about this?" Natasha asked, incredulously. "She's your girlfriend and you've been living together for the last two years!"
"That's why!" Steve groaned, shoving his hand through his hair. "Things have been good. We've been happy. I've never had a relationship last even half this long. I never thought I could have a relationship like this. She's my everything, Natasha. And what if we talk and it changes things?"
"I think that's the whole point, Steve," Natasha pointed out.
"You know what I mean. What if it changes things for the worse? What if we talk and she doesn't want to get married or she doesn't want children or..."
Natasha interrupted him. "Okay, seriously? You have not had any sort of conversation about your future? At all? Not even the 'kids' talk?"
Steve shook his head, deflating. "Well, we had the 'contraception so there are no kids while we're still running dangerous missions' talk. But that's it. I don't think a contraception talk easily segues into a children talk."
Natasha literally facepalmed. "Are you kidding me, Steve? That was the perfect time to have that conversation!" She sighed. "You know, I'm beginning to think that it's not just you. I think you and Benson are completely hopeless at all this relationship stuff and how you even got together, never mind how you made it this far, is completely beyond me."
Steve blinked and looked every inch like a lost puppy. Natasha sighed. She was going to have to take this into her own hands.
Steve walked towards the back of the quinjet and tested the comms.
"Secure channel seven?"
"Channel seven secure," Natasha confirmed as she checked her weapons. She looked out the corner of her eye at Steve. "You got any plans this Saturday?" she asked.
"No," he frowned. "Why do you ask?"
"Well," she began. "I know this lovely Italian place. Gives out free champagne when a couple gets engaged there."
Steve sighed. "Seriously? This is not the time." He walked towards the opening bay door.
"She's not gonna wait around forever, Steve!" Natasha called.
Steve shook his head as he jumped out of the jet.
Several minutes and about ten unconscious mercenaries later, Natasha parachuted in, landing next to Steve.
"Okay, how about you make her dinner... wait, no that's a terrible idea. How about you get take-out, set it up all fancy with candles?" Natasha continued, as if they had never been interrupted by Steve jumping out of a quinjet without a parachute.
"How about you secure the engine room, and then organize my love life?" Steve directed.
"I'm multi-tasking!"
Natasha slouched in the front seat of the car, one foot on the dashboard. "So tell me," she said. "Where did Captain America learn how to steal a car?"
Steve looked at her briefly, before putting his eyes back on the road. "Nazi Germany," he told her. "And we're borrowing, so get your feet off the dash."
Natasha complied, an amused smile gracing her features.
"So, I have a question for you," she said. "Which you do not have to answer, though by not answering you will, in fact, have answered..."
"What?" he snapped, impatiently.
"Am I only the third woman you've ever kissed?"
Natasha smirked unapologetically as he glanced at her.
"I swear," Steve said, eventually. "Everyone seems to have this idea of me as this paragon of virtue. I did occasionally have dates before I joined the army. And I toured with the USO girls for months. I did get some action before I turned twenty-five, you know."
"Just asking." Natasha shrugged. "You seem very reluctant to discuss your love life. Wondered whether it's just because you didn't have a lot of experience with women before Benson." She grinned. "You know Tony's convinced that you're still a virgin?"
Steve choked. "Seriously? After all this time?"
"He's convinced that you and Benson are waiting 'til marriage and no one can convince him otherwise." Natasha eyed him. "And speaking of..."
"Nat, drop it."
"Come on, Steve." She twisted to face him more. "We need to talk about this. The pair of you bottling up all your feelings like this is not healthy. Just... Just promise me you'll think about it? Ok?"
Steve sighed. "I'll think about it," he promised.
Steve wandered down a corridor in the underground base, contemplating the last few days. Bucky was alive. HYDRA was in S.H.I.E.L.D. Everything that he worked for, had died to prevent, had happened anyway. HYDRA were going to kill thousands of people because there had just been too many heads for him to cut off.
On the other hand, Fury was still alive, Natasha was mending, and Bridget was okay. Plus, he had confessed kissing Natasha and Bridget wasn't mad at him.
He didn't deserve that woman.
It was a thought that came to him often. He would look at her and realize that she was better than anything he ever thought he would deserve and some deep, dark part of him was convinced that one day, she would realize that she was too good for him and leave.
He hadn't even realized where he had been walking before he stopped outside a door and discovered his feet had taken him to the room Natasha was staying in. He took a breath and knocked, softly.
Natasha answered and he spoke before he could talk himself out of it.
"I lied, before," he blurted out. Natasha raised an eyebrow and he continued. "Well, I didn't lie, but it wasn't entirely the whole truth."
"What are you talking about, Steve?" she asked.
"It's not just my fear of changing things that's stopping me from talking about things with Bridget, not entirely." He took a breath. "I'm scared. I'm scared that one day she'll look at me and realize that I'm not the person she thought I was. She's going to realize one day that she's too good for me; she's too good a person to be with me. What if, one day, I decide to stop being Captain America, or if the serum somehow stops working, and it's the fact that I'm Captain America that she loves? I-"
Steve didn't realize that he was rambling, getting slightly more hysterical with every word, until Natasha slapped him across the face. He blinked, gathering his bearings for a moment.
"I'm sorry," he got out, before Natasha put her arms around him and hugged him.
"You are good enough," she murmured to him. "And I don't ever want to hear you say differently ever again. You deserve to be happy Steve, and Bridget makes you happy. And you make her happy. The way that she looks at you, sometimes... it's as if you hung the moon. She doesn't care that you're Captain America. She cares that you're Steve. Would you love her any less if she wasn't a mutant? If she decided to stop being a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?"
Steve balked. "Of course not!"
"Then why would you think that she would love you any less if you weren't Captain America anymore? She loves you, Steve... And if you asked her to marry you, there is not a doubt in my mind that she would say yes in a heartbeat."
Steve held her tight.
"Thank you, Nat."
Natasha popped her head into the hospital room and Steve smiled in greeting.
"Hey," she said, coming into the room. "Sorry I couldn't come by sooner. Got a lot of stuff to answer for, I guess."
The corner of Steve's mouth crooked up. "Yes," he agreed. "Yes you do."
Natasha frowned, before her eyes lit up in understanding. "You asked her." Steve nodded. "She said yes?"
Steve raised his eyebrows. "I thought there wasn't a doubt in your mind that she'd say yes?" he teased.
"I wanted to hear it from you," she protested, but she came over to the bed and hugged him. "I'm so proud of you," she said. "Congratulations."
Steve hugged her back and wondered what he had done to deserve the people in his life.
Something good, apparently.