April, 1948.
In which Steve and Peggy discuss scars.
Steve opened the bathroom door, toweling off the lower half of his face that was still wet from shaving. "Oh, sorry," he said when he saw Peggy standing outside the door. "I thought you were done. Was I keeping you waiting?" This was Steve's third morning waking up in Peggy's house, and they evidently hadn't gotten the timing of morning routines down yet. He hoped he wasn't making her late for work.
"Oh, no, it's alright," she told him. She nodded at the bathroom counter. "I just forgot my hairbrush."
"Sorry," Steve said again.
"Stop apologizing," Peggy told him. "You're acting like you're some great annoyance to me, but I want you here." She smiled softly and rested a hand on his arm. "And if we get in one another's way every now and then, that's fine. This is your home now too."
Steve smiled back at her, something warm and joyful swelling up in his chest. He'd been here for three days now, and sometimes it felt like he'd been living here with Peggy all his life, and sometimes it felt like this was just a dream that he was terrified would end. He leaned down and kissed her softly, turning as he did so so that she was in the bathroom when they broke apart and could use the hairbrush and the mirror and whatever else in there she needed to get ready.
Her hand trailed down his arm as he moved, but the smile fell away from her face as she looked back down at the path her hand was tracing. "Steve, what happened?" she asked, alarm creeping into her voice.
Steve looked down at his arm, puzzled at first, until he realized he was only half-dressed and wearing just his pants and undershirt—she had never seen the scar on his arm before.
After Steve had come back, they'd both realized that no matter how overjoyed they were to see each other again, no matter how wonderful this was, they both realized they would need some time to get used to being around each other again. While it was true that Steve had proposed before he'd been there for twenty-four hours—and Peggy had said yes just as quickly—it was still going to be a month or so before they could get married. Steve needed to have some sort of identity and paperwork and whatnot, and though Peggy's connections could get that together for him, it would still take a little time. And it seemed wise to take it slow. While Steve was staying in her house (because where else was he going to go?), he was sleeping in her spare room, and would until the wedding. So, while they had hardly left each other's sides, Steve in his undershirt and Peggy with her hair still all in a mess was the most unkempt they'd seen each other since he came back.
"Thanos," Steve told her, running a hand over the scar. It didn't hurt anymore, but it wasn't quite finished healing. He forgot about it most of the time, but her drawing attention to it reminded him that it was kind of itchy where the skin was knitting back together. "In the final battle. It was bad enough I had to use the straps of my shield to hold it together until we were done."
"Does it hurt?" she asked softly.
"Not anymore," he replied. With all the jumping around in time he'd been doing, it was hard to keep track, but the injury was really only about two weeks old. As fast as he healed, he'd been able to get the stitches out before he went to put the Stones back, but it still had a little while to go. And it had been deep enough, he knew that even with the way he healed, it was going to leave a scar. "It'll fade some more," he told her. "But I don't think it'll ever completely disappear." He gave her a half smile. "Hope you don't mind." He didn't think she was so shallow as to be put off by it, but he was afraid sometimes of just how much he'd changed—as the high of being reunited faded, would she find she didn't recognize him anymore? That scar was just a visual reminder of how different he was now.
She ran a gentle finger along the line of the scar, then, instead of answering, she pulled her hands away from him and started untucking her shirt. She pulled the hem of her shirt up and the waist of her skirt down, just enough to reveal a dark, roughly circular-shaped scar about the size of a quarter on the left side of her stomach. Steve couldn't help a surprised gasp at the sight of it, and his hand went out automatically to touch it before he caught himself and pulled back.
"It's alright," she said. She let go of her skirt and took his wrist, guiding his hand to her side. "This one doesn't hurt anymore either."
Steve brushed his fingers carefully over the old wound, and the skin was rippled slightly over the scar tissue, but it was still smooth and whole, healed as best as it could be. "What happened?" he asked sadly. He didn't mind that she had a scar, but he hated that she'd gotten hurt badly enough to leave one.
"I fell off a railing," she replied. "Landed badly on a metal rod sticking up out of some concrete." Steve's eyes widened in shock and she turned a little bit, revealing the matching scar on her lower back.
"Aw, Peggy," he breathed, a waver in his voice.
"It was either that or certain death at the hands of Whitney Frost," she said, letting go of her shirt and taking both of his hands in both of hers. "And I'm alright now," she told him, kissing his fingers. "Just like you are." She kissed his fingers again. "I know the years you spent away from me were longer than the years I spent away from you, but we've both been rather battered since then." Her eyes drifted down to the scar on his arm then back up to his face. "In more ways than one. But we've both survived it. And we've both found each other again." Her eyes were watering somewhat, but she was smiling. "We are different than what we used to be. There's not really any denying that. But we're together," she said firmly.
She let go of his hands and wrapped her arms around him, resting her head against his chest with a happy sigh when his arms returned the gesture. "We're together," she said again softly. "And no matter how different either of us may be, nothing's different at all. Because we still fit." She raised her head up to look into his eyes. "This is where we belong, Steve," she said. "This is where we've always belonged and where we always will." She stretched up and kissed him softly. "I love you, darling," she whispered. "Scars and all."
