A Promise Made
Four days ago Rose, Peggy's longtime, loyal, assistant, showed up at the faded red brick brownstone in Brooklyn with shopping bags full of the items on the list Angie had sent Peggy off to work with that morning. Along with the diapers, juice, milk, and teething biscuits Rose came barring apologises from Peggy who'd been suddenly called away. Rose had said it was just business, but if it had been just an unexpected business trip Peggy would have called and told Angie herself. Angie would have known where Peggy was going and when she'd be back. Peggy would have told her herself that if she needed anything while she was away to call Rose, not have Rose tell her nervously as she apologized for not being able to tell Angie where Peggy had gone, and how long she'd be gone for. Rose showing up at their home like that had told Angie everything she needed to know. Peggy hadn't gone on a sudden business trip, she's gone on a mission.
Angie's accusations, which Rose tried so hard to deny so Angie wouldn't worry, were proven right when Peggy walked into their home with her left arm in a sling and an expression of guilt on her face. It was late, Johnny Carson had just finished his monolog, when Angie heard Peggy come in. A part of Angie that had been tense and worried for the last four days began to relax, especially after hearing Peggy's voice call out, "Angie, love, are you still up, my darling?"
Peggy's voice was soft because of the late hour, but Angie could still hear the concern and guilt that tinted the other woman's accented words. Good, Angie thought as she reached for the remote to turn off the television. Peggy should feel guilty. Angie sat there for a moment thinking about all the rehearsed things she wanted to say to Peggy while watching the picture on the screen fold in on itself until it was a white line across the center of the screen which then shrank into a white dot before disappearing all together. Then she pushed herself off the sofa and walked across the room, through the archway door and into the foyer just in time to see Peggy shrugging off an army green jacket twelve sizes too big for her. Angie didn't need to see the Dugan name patch to know it was Dum Dum's jacket. Angie wasn't sure if knowing Peggy had been with the 107th boys, her Howling Commandos, was better or worse. She knew that the Howlies would give their own lives before letting anything take their best gal's, their sister in arms, Dum Dum had made her that promise long ago. But she also knew that the Howlies who joined SHIELD took on the roughest and toughest missions, the kinds of missions that required the brute force that men like Dum Dum were best at.
"Yeah, Peggy, I'm still up." Angie finally replies to Peggy's initial question. When her wife, they'd exchanged vows in a tiny chapel in Vermont presided over by the same Episcopal minister who'd preformed Natasha's christening on a date Peggy had insisted on because, "It's the day I first walked into the automat, and that day changed my life for the better.", turned to face her Angie's heart drops to her stomach. She spots the sling and rushes forward, closing the distance between herself and Peggy. "What happened?"
"Oh this?" Peggy tries to wave off her wife's worry and concern. "It's nothing darling, just a bit of a dislocation and slight puncture wound."
Angie looked at Peggy with wide disbelieving eyes. "And that's nothing!?"
"I've had worse, love." Peggy replies as she reaches towards Angie.
Shaking her head Angie takes a step back out of Peggy's reach. "Don't."
"Angie?" Peggy watched her wife with a knot in her stomach. She knew when she made the choice to go with the Howling Commandos on this mission that Angie would be upset with her. The expensive Italian wine and Swiss chocolate in her duffle bag were meant to be forgive me presents for Angie, and the hand crafted wooden lamb was for Natasha. But the level of anger in Angie's blue-green eyes was rather frightening. "Love, I'm…"
"Shut up, Margaret." Angie said with another shake of head. Crossing her arms over her chest Angie glared at the brunette, ignoring her big brown doe eyes, wide with uncertainty. She wasn't just going to let Peggy off easy this time. "For years I've overlooked these little unexpected missions of yours, Margaret. They don't happen often, once a year, maybe twice, and I figured if lettin' you run off with the fellas once or twice a year helped you feed that need for adventure of yours, and as long as you always came back to me, what harm could do it? I'd let you scratch that itch, and I wouldn't have to worry so much about you gettin' bored of our dull day to day life."
"Oh Angie." Peggy said softly as she took a step towards her love. "I…"
"I said hush, woman!" Angie snapped at Peggy and then sighed. When Peggy paled and nodded Angie sighed and continued. "But I can't look past it any more, Margaret, because it ain't just you and me anymore." Taking the few steps keeping them apart, Angie reached out and grabbed hold of Peggy's right hand, and then pulled her up the stairs and down the hall to the nursery. Though Angie lowered her voice so she wouldn't wake the sleeping fourteen month old in her crib, the sharpness of her tone remained. "You made that little girl a promise, Margaret Elizabeth Carter. And while I get that to you, that promise means savin' and protectin' the world she lives in, that's not what that promise means to her." Angie points to the shock of red curls that can be seen in the crib from the warm light spilling into the room through the open door from the hallway.
"To that sweet baby girl the promise you made her means that her Mummy comes home every night and sits on the floor with her to play no matter how tired she is. To her that promise means Mummy is at the dinner table watching her get more spaghetti in her hair and on her face than in her mouth, and that Mummy is there to give her a bath, and read her Winne the Pooh in the rocking chair." Angie's voice remains soft but scolding as she continues. "The only monsters she's going to care about you slaying are the ones under her bed when she's older and her imagination kicks in. As far as Natasha is concerned, the only world that matters to her is you, because to your daughter, our daughter, you and I are her world, Margaret, and you running off to save the larger one outside these walls, is putting her world at risk."
Angie paused to let everything she'd said sink in. When she looked at Peggy, there were unshed tears welling in those big brown doe eyes, but as hard as it was Angie didn't back down. "I knew what I was gettin' into lovin' you, Peggy. I jumped into us head first with no regrets. I would never ask you to rethink this need of yours to run off fully cocked into the chaos and dark shadows of this crazy ass world just for me. But I made that baby girl a promise too, so I'm askin' for her, because damnit Peggy, she should have a Mummy who can fucking pick her up when she gets home from work."
Peggy's honestly shell shocked by the time Angie finishes. She isn't sure what to think, and can't get a handle on how she feels, so she just stands there just inside the nursery door even after Angie walks off leaving her alone. She vaguely registers the sound of a door opening and closing not too far from where she's stood. Angie must have gone to their room. This had been the first time an opportunity for her to go out into the field had come up since Natasha came into her life. Peggy always tried to make such decisions while keeping Angie, and now their daughter, in mind, but it had been such a long time since she'd been in the field. Her desire to be back out there had been an itch under her skin, one she could not, or chose not to, ignore. She didn't see the harm in going. While the mission level had been top tier, Peggy's cockiness and perhaps a bit of that wonder lust for adventure Angie had mentioned, had caused her to downgrade the true risk she'd been taking.
When the burning in her eyes became too much to bare Peggy closed them, forcing the tears that had gathered there to roll down her cheeks. Normally she would have reached up and wiped away the wetness from her face with annoyance, but this time she just let the evidence of her guilt remain until she heard soft whimpers coming from across the room. Natasha was a good solid sleeper, the only time she wasn't was when she was sick or upset. The tension in the room created by her mothers must have disturbed her rest. Wiping away her tears so she wouldn't further distress her child, Peggy walked over to the crib but when she realized she was unable to pick her baby up to comfort her because she'd gone on a mission and gotten hurt, the tears started anew.
"Shh poppet," Peggy says softly. Her voice is thick with emotion and tight from trying to keep the emotions light for Natasha's sake. She reaches into the crib to brush a gossamere caress over Natasha's chubby cheek. "Shh, my darling, Mummy's here." Natasha settles a little but not enough, and is soon fully awake and whimpering a bit more loudly as she blinks watery blue-green sleepy eyes up at her. Peggy's heart breaks, and her voice cracks as she calls out softly, "Angie," The baby monitor is on and she knows Angie can hear her. "Darling, I need your help please."
When Angie returns to their daughter's room it's evident that every Carter in the house has shed a tear or fifty in these wee hours of the morning. It hurts Angie to walk in and see her girls in tears but she isn't ready to let Peggy outta the dog house yet. Walking across the room she makes her way over to the crib to pick Natasha up. "I got her, Peggy."
"No." Peggy said softly but firmly. "Please." Her voice is slightly pleading. "I'll sit in the rocker I just need you to hand her to me."
"You sure?" Angie asks, eyeing Peggy's arm in it's sling. She can now see the corner of white gaze and medical tape peeking out from her the neckline of Peggy's shirt. More evideance that Peggy had been injuried on this stupid misson of hers. "If she bumps your arm, is it gonna hurt?"
"More than likely." Peggy says honestly as she sits in the rocker chair. "A small penance to pay for being gone."
Angie eyes her wife with a hard look for a moment, and then reaches into the crib with a soft, warm smile for their daughter's sake. "Hey angel, shh, it's ok baby girl." She holds her daughter in her arms, giving her a reassuring cuddle, and then walks her over to Peggy. "Look, Nattie, Mummy's home."
Natasha sniffles softly as she is placed on Peggy's lap. Peggy wraps her good arm around her daughter, adjusts her a bit because of the sling, and pulls the baby as close to her as she can get her. She looks down into her daughter's eyes, sees the way Natasha is looking at her, and Peggy realizes Angie's right. Natasha's whole world is right here in this room, it's her and it's Angie. "Hello my darling girl," Peggy says softly as she continues to look into her daughter's eyes. "Mummy owes you and Mama an apology, poppet. I was rather selfish, you see. Which is why Mummy's been gone for the last few days, and why Mama's awfully cross with me." She hears Angie snort and for the first time since walking into their home Peggy smiles. "Sometimes Mummy will have to go away for a few days for work, that can't always be helped, but this time Mummy went away more for herself than anything else. Uncle Dum Dum and the gents could have handled things just fine, but when he asked Mummy to come along, well, I made a selfish call my loves, and I'm sorry."
"I wouldn't be half as mad, Peggy, if it were a legit something only you could handle personally." Angie said softly from where she was standing, leaning slightly against the crib. "But you sent Rose, which told me you were to chicken shit to tell me you were runnin' off to play Howlie with the fellas. Like I said, if it were still just you and me, I'd let it slide, but it ain't so I couldn't."
"You have every right to be angry with me." Peggy said as she looked up from Natasha's blue-green eyes to Angie's.
"I love you, Peggy." Angie tells her wife. "All of you, ever bit and every piece that makes you, you. I ain't askin' ya to change. It's just that, well, you got a bigger purpose now, ya know?"
Peggy looked back down at Natasha who was drifting back towards sleep as she rocked them gently back and forth. "Yes, I know."
"Good." Angie replies with a firm nod.
"Angie." Peggy says softly as she once again looks up at her wife. After Angie hums softly at her in acknowledgement she says, "You know that you and Natasha are my everything, don't you?"
Angie smiles and walks over to kneel down in front of Peggy and their daughter. "Yeah, English, I know that. And you and her, you're everything I ever wanted and more."
Peggy smiles, relief washing over her at the forgiveness she now sees in Angie's eyes. "I love you, darling."
"I love you too, English." Angie beams. "But if you ever pull a stunt like this again I'm gonna kick your ass."
"Duly noted my love." Peggy replies, and then shifts her warm relieved smile into a pout. "Now that I have been sufficiently chastised, may I please have my welcome home kiss?"
Angie laughs which startles Natasha nearly awake again. "Shit." She whispers, and then holds her breath to see if the baby goes back to sleep. When Natasha settles, nuzzling her chubby little face into Peggy's chest, Angie relaxes and leans up to kiss Peggy hello.
Once Natasha is fully back to sleep, Angie carefully takes her from Peggy and puts her back in her crib. Then takes Peggy's hand and leads her to their room where she helps her wife get ready for bed. "So what did you manage to get punctured by, Peg?"
"Would you believe it was a sais." Peggy chuckles nervously.
"What the hell is a sais?" Angie asks while running her fingers gently over the bandages on Peggy's shoulder. After Peggy describes the weapon Angie looks at her and blinks. "Jesus, Peg, what the hell were you fighting, ninjas?"
"Sort of, actually, yes." Peggy replies honestly which just makes Angie shake her head.
"No wonder you couldn't pass up the chance to go." Angie replies.
Peggy reaches for Angie's hand and holds it tight. "Never again, Angie. I promise."
"Don't make promises you can't keep, English." Angie warns her.
"I'm not." Peggy replies. "Angie, I mean it. I truly am sorry."
"I don't want you resenting us for it, Peg, but Nattie and I need you here, whole, in one piece, and very much alive." Angie whispers.
Peggy pulls her close, wrapping her good arm around her love. "I could never resent being loved by you and our child, Angela. Nor could I ever regret loving you and her in return."
Angie relaxes into Peggy's embrace.
"You'll see my love." Peggy reassured the woman she loves. "I will be much better at keeping my promises from now on."