"I bought you some new clothes, I hope that's not weird," Sharon said as she dropped a bunch of shopping bags in his doorway. "I think the sizes are right, it's been a while."

"Not weird, that's generous, thank you," he said as he moved the bags on top of his bed. "What do I owe you?"

"Nothing, I charged it on Tony's card," she said with a smile. "I realized you didn't have too much when I did laundry the other day, so I was shopping for myself and saw some things I thought you might like. Receipts are in the bag if they don't fit or you hate them."

"No, this is perfect," he said as he pulled out the clothes. She bought him a new wardrobe. "I never really bothered to shop after I came back, I had whatever I packed and came back with. Didn't need much."

"Of course you didn't," she said as she rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "Well, I also bought Morgan and myself a bunch of things too. It's the least Stark could do."

"We have access to his accounts?"

"I do," she grinned widely. "Happy is taking Morgan for the weekend to visit Rhodes, he'll pick her up later today. It's just the two of us this weekend."

"Any big plans?"

"I have to touch base with Yelena to see how things are going. I dropped a tip about a weapons sale, but I don't think anyone from Hydra is interested in this," she said, cautiously watching him to see if he got angry but he didn't. "How about you?"

"I never have plans," he said sheepishly. "Sam and Bucky are out on a mission for a bit."

"Yeah, I think they were stopping in Wakanda too to pick up stuff from Shuri," Sharon said. "I asked Bucky to ask Shuri and King T'Challa if they know anything about Extremis. They're way more advanced than Stark so maybe they can help."

"They've done a lot for us already," Steve warned, feeling bad about how much they relied on King T'Challa.

"They have, which is why I went to Bucky. He knows them best," she said, ignoring the way he said it. "Do you maybe want to order chinese food later and watch a movie?"

"That'd be nice," he smiled.

Sharon was annoyed as she smoothed out the wrinkles in her dress. She planned on wearing a comfy sweatshirt as she dug into some lo mein and made sure Steve was up to speed on the Harry Potter movies. This was not the plan.

"You look nice for movie night," Steve said as Sharon came downstairs in a black fitted dress. He noticed she looked annoyed, which he took to mean there was a change in plans for her evening from the ones she suggested earlier. She gave him a small smile at the compliment as she fidgeted with an earring that wasn't closing. "Big date?"

"Not a date," she said quickly. "It's for work. Yelena set up a meeting with a contact here that might prove useful. Contact happens to be a guy who likes fancy restaurants."

"So it's a date," he smirked and she huffed in annoyance at him.

"Maybe for him, not to me. Gotta play the part though, right?"

"With certain people," he said and she nodded. "Will you be back late?"

"I hope not, I don't think this will take long," she said with a sigh. "I'm sorry, I didn't know she set this up."

"Is it safe," he asked. "I can come with if you need."

"Big, brooding man who looks like Steve Rogers because he is Steve Rogers staring at me while I eat probably would be suspicious," she said. "I appreciate the offer, but I got it covered."

"Noted," he said. "Rain check on chinese food and movies?"

"I'd like that," she said with a smile before turning back to him. "I was really looking forward to that."

"Me too," he said, feeling his cheeks blush. "If things go south, call me. You're not in it alone anymore."

Sharon nodded before leaving, unable to speak because she felt her chest tighten with emotion. After all that time, she really wasn't alone anymore.

Sharon came home a little past midnight. Steve didn't necessarily wait up for her, but he did start another movie and grab another beer instead of going to bed when he realized she wasn't back yet. He heard her drop her bag on the table and the familiar sound of her heels dropping to the floor after a long night. She was heading into the kitchen when she noticed him still in the living room.

"New Godzilla movies?"

"Bucky told me about the Monster Verse," Steve said, still confused by it all. "I finished the first one and then just started the second."

"I haven't seen this one," she said, pausing to think. "Mind if I join you?"

"I can pause it so you can change, if you want."

"That'd be great," she said with a smile as she headed off to her room.

She came back down a few minutes later with a freshly washed face and baggy pajamas. Steve had to force himself to look away, he never got used to how beautiful she really was. He hopes he never does. He handed her a beer and restarted the movie.

"So," he asked during a particularly long action scene. "How was dinner?"

"On first look, I don't know how useful the guy is, but I trust Yelena. Her intel says he could lead us to people working on stuff like Extremis and the serum. I told him I'd be in touch."

"Is it dangerous that he knows you're the Powerbroker?"

"Very few people know it's me, I tell everyone I'm an associate. People who find out don't last too long," she said, whispering the last part as she sipped her beer, hoping he didn't hear but she knew he did.

"Sam told me what happened with the serum," Steve said and she nodded. "I had to work it out in my head a bit to try to understand."

"I lost control of the situation," she said and he looked at her, waiting for her to continue. "I obviously would never create more super soldiers, and I hope you know at least that. I had to deal with one thing at a time, but it spiraled. I took Karli in, I saw a lost girl who was getting screwed by the world. I saw someone like me, I wanted to help her. That went sideways fast."

"Why not destroy it immediately?"

"I thought about it, but I didn't know at the time who created it and I didn't want more created. I thought if I held on to it like I wanted more, I could lure him out, which I eventually did. I had Nagel locked up in the storage unit for the longest time. Then I thought how maybe it'd be good for Stark and Banner to have."

"Seriously," he asked and she nodded. "Why?"

"I don't know what all the serum could do, what good it could do if it's in the right hands," she said and watched his face turn to a look of understanding. "Plus, god forbid something happened to you or Bucky that was almost fatal, there'd be some form of the serum that could help. I didn't expect Karli and her buddies to steal it and then use it themselves."

"You're very different from the stories, Powerbroker," Steve teased and she threw a pillow at him.

"I was angry, and I was in survival mode, but I'd never reach the big bad level I was made out to be," she said with a small shrug. "I was far from an angel though, I did my share of bad."

They sat in silence again for a while as they continued to watch the movie. Sharon had gotten up to grab some more beer and a bag of chips at a point. Steve smiled as she hogged the chips like she used to, occasionally tilting the bag toward him for him to take.

"Nice to know this is still the same," he said as he snatched the bag from her hands and she gasped.

"That was rude," she said as she grabbed it back from him. "I offered you some."

"The bag is basically empty."

"Can't help it you're too slow when I offer," she said with a shrug. "Was Peggy a chip hog too back in the day?"

She blamed the wine at dinner and three beers for opening this can of worms.

"Uh no, she wasn't much of a snacker," he said and Sharon nodded. "She liked to eat oranges after dinner, which wasn't as fun to steal as a bag of chips."

"Hm yes, I do remember the oranges," she said. "You can not answer this, but what happened?"

"I don't know," he said, not completely being honest. He knew deep down what went wrong, he just wasn't ready to face that truth himself yet, let know tell it to Sharon. "I thought we were happy, but I think maybe I was blind to the obvious issues we had."

Sharon noticed his demeanor changed slightly, his shoulders sagging a bit but he didn't look as upset as she expected.

"You've never been the most observant," she said teasingly, giving him an out if he didn't want to continue.

"That is true," he smiled, feeling like he should continue. "As hard of a time I had adjusting to modern times, it was a lot worse adjusting back to the old ways. I realized there were aspects of her personality that I didn't see while we were at war that I didn't like, and she felt the same toward me."

"Aunt Peggy had her quirks," Sharon said diplomatically, taking a sip of her beer.

"Quirks is a word for her," he laughed humorlessly. "I couldn't figure out what she wanted from me. I never gave her a problem when she left for missions. She was capable of handling herself and after living in this time for so long and being surrounded by women like you, Natasha, Hill. I don't know. Maybe I should have fought her more on it, asked her to be the typical housewife?"

"She would have actually shot you," Sharon said.

"It was like she was looking for that though. I wasn't going to keep her from what she was meant to do."

"That's interesting, actually," she mused, thinking about to one moment they were on the run together pulling a mission that came up. "Peggy was still in her early-ish years at SSRI. You wouldn't say anything to her before she left on a mission?"

"Basically what I told you earlier," he shrugged. "Just to be safe, to let me know if she needed back up. Why?"

"Okay I wasn't going out on a mission earlier, that was meeting. However, I distinctly remember the two of us getting into that huge argument before an actual mission. Remember that job in Beirut," she said and he nodded in recognition. "Did you not think I was capable?"

"Of course I did," he said quickly, but meant it. "I watched you fight the Winter Solider, you're Avenger-level, Sharon."

"So why fight with me about going out with you and Sam, but wish a young Agent Peggy Carter good luck on solo missions," she said and he didn't have an answer - or maybe he did but the two of them weren't ready for it. She got up to get them more beer. If this conversation was continuing, they'd need it.

"She also was annoyed that I'd complain about the food a lot," he said suddenly, things getting a little too heavy for where they were at right now. "Chinese food was not the best back then."

"What was the final straw?"

"I think it was a lot of little things," he said with a sigh. "We started arguing more. She'd go out on more missions when she wasn't needed, and I'd be stuck home with not much to do. We never really got around to figuring out how to explain that I was back, so I'd be home a lot. We were based in New York for a while, and then she had to move to LA. She started packing her stuff, but wasn't touching anything that was mine or that she considered ours. That's when I knew it was over. She was polite about it, which I think made it harder. I think if she wanted to fight for us, she wouldn't have ended things over mid-morning tea."

"Did you want to fight," Sharon asked and he shrugged. "It's difficult to be faced with reality when you find yourself in love with an ideal."

"I think deep down I realized it wasn't worth the fight. I knew she lived a long, successful life without me being part of it, and if she wasn't happy who was I to keep her from still obtaining that life?"

"Would you have fought for her if you didn't have the knowledge of her future?"

"I," he said and paused, never really considering the answer to that question before. "I don't think so. In the end, we weren't compatible. Like you said, I was in love with an ideal."

"I think it's interesting that she still ended up with Uncle Daniel, like they were really meant to be," Sharon said thoughtfully. "I never gave much weight to soulmates before, but maybe there's something there."

"It's worth taking note of when two people keep ending up together in some sort of situation," he said, glancing at Sharon who hummed in agreement. "Looks like Godzilla saved the day again."

"You think the Avengers could take Godzilla," Sharon asked, changing the topic.

"I think if we had the Hulk," Steve said thoughtfully.

"We could probably get those shrinking discs from Scott and throw it at Godzilla to make him teeny," Sharon said. "How long do they keep you small?"

"Not sure, but Godzilla is meant to keep order so if he's not around, things could get crazy."

"Too bad we didn't have him during Thanos," she sighed. "He could have eaten him before he snapped."

"Maybe Thanos did one good thing with that snap," Steve said sincerely as he glanced over at her.

hope you all enjoyed this chapter! just a few more to go. updates might not be as regular as i've been busy and still have to finish writing a chapter, start writing the last chapter & edit what i've already got written.