...
He isn't surprised to see her standing there when midnight strikes.
It's rather worrying actually of how predictable he could be sometimes, though he doesn't like admitting to it. He knows someone would've found him eventually; he'd even readied a definite speech of "I'd rather be alone" just in case. But he doesn't deliver it when she slides her thin frame right up next to him, later on stretching her legs outwards in a careful manner, as though she will be touching shards of glasses with her boot-covered toes at the edge of the creaky rooftop.
He takes notice of the wrapped up leg that's next to his thigh, but doesn't comment ― and looks ahead.
The night is beautifully silent.
He's so glad at this moment that Maria Hill is not a talkative person.
His elbows are supported by the knees that he's kept close to his chest, and Steve ducks his head to inhale the air hovering around his collarbone. He doesn't mention about the burning lungs and the squeezing chest (it's like he's that little weak kid Bucky always save back in the dark alley, y'know?) and doesn't admit to the clattering of his teeth as the memory of blood and explosion and war and oh God I can't take this dear Lord save me I beg of you tugs on the back of his skull.
For that one moment, Steve can't breathe.
As though on queue, he looks up and traces the constellation in his mind. Not that he knows a lot― but he reads some of it. He doesn't think much about the night sky since the whole Chitauri event, finding it more unsettling as it only reminds him of a portal to an endless list of even more extraordinary threats; but he doesn't deny of the beauty.
Something twinkles and sweeps across.
It takes a moment for him to realise the shape of it ―Bucky used to pull him up just to see these things sometimes, back when he's still that little punk that got into fights and Buck's the reckless kid nobody else seems to like― and he gapes at the sky in complete awe.
He doesn't even fully register that she's actually there until he feels a pressure of her shoulder being pressed against his side and she's leaning in closer to whisper, "I think you're supposed to make a wish."
That's right, his mind reminds. A shooting star.
He manages up a quirky smile without meeting her eyes. His connected hands that are intertwine together in a lock in between his knees tighten, already drawing up the dreadfulness of the situation; the depression now clawing against his skin. He wonders if she notices. She must. She's trained to. "I never peg you to be superstitious."
"Oh," she snorts. "I'm not. But I thought you might be."
Sometimes, he doesn't answer back. Instead, he goes with: "I wish... I wish I'd just, stop existing. Sometimes. It's just." He stops, and gnaws at his bottom lips. He doesn't exactly know why he said what he'd said, but it's out there.
Oh man, he really doesn't want to talk about this.
"I don't..." He tries covering it up, forcing out strings of choked-up laughter from his mouth. "I don't know. I just, I mean―" It takes him another second to register the silence she's treating him with. He looks at her as she stared ahead ―flat mouth, expressionless mask, dark eyes not exactly judging but it's calculating, she's thinking― and licks his lips, flicks his toes. "I don't... want to die, but... sometimes I just."
He stops then, and thinks about the possibility.
"It's... difficult."
She finally looks down, sorta hopelessly, dropping her shoulders down and easing off from any military stance she's known to keep up with. "It's not easy, no," she finally agrees, looks up again and he notices how the corner of her thin mouth twitches. It's pale, her lips, not as though he hasn't seen those in such condition before― but it's still baffling to realise that from times to times how these strong characters surrounding him are, by the end of the day, still pretty much human beings. Still pretty much look as ordinary and completely, earthly normal like the rest of the world.
She doesn't say anything more. Not for a while.
"Do you know Peter Pan?" He knows by now that the question doesn't really demand any answer, and lets her continue when she swipes a fallen dark hair away from her own face. "There's this quote. It goes: to live would be an awfully big adventure."
He waits for a second, then two.
"Is there a point?"
She narrows her eyes, but not accusingly. "Not really." A shrug, and then: "I figured it should be relevant, somewhat."
He stares at her, like he's always been doing he guesses, because there's always this enigma with Maria Hill that he still couldn't figure out wholly and it's honestly quite astonishing how she manages to continuously surprises him in every turn. It doesn't even matter if it's field-related or otherwise.
This time, her silver eyes catch his blue ones, and he's awestruck momentarily by the way it reflects the lack of light― like how it flickers and disappears and glints again. Like glitter, he's reminded. "For what it's worth, I'm personally glad you didn't get swallowed whole and disappear from the galaxy, Cap. It'd be a shame not to have you around. Barton really fancies you."
There's a smirk in her expression when she says the last sentences, which makes him smile. A little.
It doesn't shock him when the next thing he knows is that she's slipping her hand into his, even going it as far as tugging his wrist to make her intention evidently clear. She leans onto him even more, thudding the hollow of her cheek against the junction of his shoulder and he― he lets her. He doesn't exactly kiss the top of her head, but his lips brush whether she notices or not, and he doesn't complaint about the breach of personal space. Not as though this is the first time.
"What were you doing out here anyway?" He finally asks her gently, pressing his nose against her hair only once.
"I needed a smoke." She answers and he smiles to himself, but only a little. He knows by then that Maria Hill hasn't smoked since 2017; it could only mean one thing when she says that― she can't sleep. (It kinda makes him happy, you know, that he knows these little stuff about her. Especially things that nobody seem to notice but him.) He squeezes her hand lamely, as though secretly informing her that that's one lie she can't get pass him.
He's silent for a long time and the air of depression hangs over him like a curtain once again, before: "What do you wish for, Maria?"
She smirks at that, maybe. "Sometimes I wish you'd just smile, Rogers. And that would've meant the world to me."