(A/N: Welcome back!

I've been plagued by Rogers family feels... which is seriously messing with me studying for finals. Hah. But what else is new in the life of a fanfiction writer?

Please message me or leave a review with any scenes you'd like to see! I'm always open to prompts!

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Enjoy!)

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"Dad?"

Steve Rogers glanced up from his paperwork, his fingers halting their rhythmic taps on the tabletop. "Ginny?"

"I'm confused." The girl slumped down in her chair. Her sharp blue eyes were bloodshot and her cheeks lacked their usual pink tinge.

He leaned his elbow on the table and raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

"I don't know, but nothing makes sense."

"Want to see if we can fix that?"

Virginia Rogers heaved a dramatic sigh and buried her face in her hands. "Maybe . . . I just don't know if I'll ever understand algebra."

"Well, the more you worry about it, the less you'll get done."

Sighing again, Ginny rested her head on her forearm, staring sideways at her father. "How about I drop out of high school and join SHIELD? Think they would hire a sixteen-year-old?"

"Sure," Steve shrugged. "How much military experience do you have?"

"I would have more if you and Mom would start training me."

"We've been over this . . ."

"I know, I know, but someday? Maybe?"

Steve sat back, twirled the pen in his hand, and set a thoughtful gaze on his daughter. "Ginny," he began gently, "you know we never said no. If you still want to be an agent in a few years, we'll both support you, you know that. But no one should be training for war at sixteen. I've seen . . . I know a few people who regretted it."

For once, Ginny didn't push the subject.

Steve resumed his paperwork, and his daughter switched from math to English for the time being, already looking more relaxed.

Eventually, the repetitive, tedious penning of information morphed into some sketches, and before he knew it, Steve was fully invested in a tiny drawing of a woman laughing. He drew a messy, ombre braid resting on her shoulder, a triangular piece of a sandwich in her hand, and she was wearing a miniature necklace in the shape of an arrow.

Natasha.

He missed her. He missed their effortless friendship, which had only grown stronger those five years after the Snap. The memory of her was still painful, but he slowly noticed details fading away. He hadn't seen her in almost twenty years. He hadn't seen any of them in that long. In some ways, it seemed like yesterday that they all sat around the big dinner table in the Avengers headquarters, Natasha making faces at the food he'd cooked, Sam breaking out into sudden laughter at some new thing he'd found on the internet, and Wanda making everyone roll their eyes as she levitated food to and from the table.

"Who's that?" Ginny leaned over, craning her neck to see her father's sketch.

Steve smiled, a wave of nostalgia engulfing his thoughts. "An old friend."

"From the war?"

His children knew he was a World War II veteran, and that he was heavily involved in the SSR and SHIELD, but very little past that. "Sort of, yeah. Her name was Natasha," he offered. "We named your sister after her."

Ginny's eyebrows flew up. "No kidding?" She thought for a moment, then asked, "Was I named after anyone?"

Before Steve could answer, the front door slammed open and the sound of footsteps traveled down the hall.

"Dad!" a voice called.

"In the kitchen," Steve answered over his shoulder.

"Dad, you gotta come quick, Grant got pushed—" Anthony paused for air, "—and he scraped his arms up and I think his foot is broken . . ."

Steve stood up so fast his chair nearly fell over. Grasping his son's shoulder, he noticed dirt stains on the boy's chin and some streaks of blood on his knuckles. There was more to this story—his parental instincts were strong enough. "What? Are you okay? Where's Grant?"

Anthony led his father and sister two blocks down, through the small suburban neighborhood, to a sidewalk where a boy sat, leaning against a tree and holding his elbow. His eyes were closed, and his breath came in ragged, shallow gasps. A girl sat next to him, knees tucked against her chest, her bright red hair plastered to her forehead.

Steve knelt beside his son, hands searching for injuries. "Hey, buddy," he breathed.

The boy cracked his eyes open. They were glazed over and red from crying. "Daddy . . . I think my foot . . . is broken."

"You'll be fine, just relax. I'm going to pick you up, okay?"

Grant nodded and took a sharp breath as soon as Steve's arm wrapped under his legs. "Do I gotta go . . . to the hospital?"

Lifting his son effortlessly and gently, Steve kissed the boy's forehead. "I don't know yet. We'll see. It's probably a sprain, anyway."

As the family made their way back home, that wave of nostalgia still lingered in Steve's mind. He remembered being small, smaller than fourteen-year-old Grant, and virtually helpless, except for an inordinate amount of grit and idiotic, righteous determination. He had spent so much of his life in a hospital, trying to recover from one illness or another, being all the while plagued with asthma, heart problems, high blood pressure, scoliosis, stomach ulcers, anemia, and chronic colds. How he'd lived to be even twenty-five, he had no idea. It must have been some sort of supernatural miracle combined with the grace of God that kept him alive so long.

When he and Peggy began talking about children, during the year they were engaged, the thought occurred to him that maybe there was a flaw in his thinking regarding the super-soldier serum. What if all those genetic diseases could be passed to his children, even though he'd been healed from them? Were they still part of his DNA? Peggy didn't think so. She'd seen Erskine's research, and it included total re-building of genetics, so that none of those conditions reappeared in a person's system. They decided not to worry, and that time would tell.

And it did. His five children were as healthy as small horses, without even a slight sign of asthma, anemia, or scoliosis. In fact, their healing abilities far surpassed those of a normal child. They could fully recover from a small cut in two days, and the injuries never left a scar. They were also taller than average, and their metabolisms were so high, the sheer amount of groceries the Rogers family went through was nearly inhuman. But they were healthy, and the relief Steve felt when James was born and these facts were revealed was almost palpable.

After laying Grant on the couch and making sure he sipped a glass of water, Steve scanned his son's legs, making him move his joints, twist his ankles, bend his elbows, and he felt for any extra swelling. Everything seemed normal. There were a few huge bruises, and the arch of Grant's foot was sore to the touch, but nothing urgent.

Steve breathed a sigh of relief. "Alright, young man," he began, kindly but firmly. "What happened?"

The boy looked ashamed. "I . . . I mean . . . there was a group of big guys, and . . ." His lip quivered. ". . . How about Nat tells you?"

Steve glanced over at Ginny's identical twin.

Natalie sat on the edge of a chair, chin on her fist. She, too, was as white as a sheet. "It was pretty weird, Dad. Grant ran a block ahead of us on the way home, and these older guys from school came and talked to him . . . pretty loud, and all of a sudden he was just . . . laying there, so I screamed and ran up there, and . . . maybe I punched one, I don't remember, but eventually they went away . . . And he had bruises—" she motioned to her brother, "—and Anthony ran to get you, and that's all I remember." Her hand shook visibly.

Steve's chest felt like it would explode into flames. His instincts told him to beat to dust anyone who would dare to hurt his child, but then he remembered that the attackers were only teenagers. So he took a breath, let it out slowly, and asked, "Do they go to the high school?"

"Yeah, they're in the girls' grade." Anthony offered.

Steve shook his head. Those boys should be locked up for a day or two . . . but he couldn't decide that for them. And that frustrated him.

"What will you do?" Natalie asked.

"We'll wait . . . and discuss it with your mother tonight. She'll have a better idea."

This seemed to satisfy the kids, and even Nat's face regained some color.

For a while, they all sat in various spots—Anthony sprawled on the carpet, Nat and Ginny sharing the wide, soft easy chair, and Grant dozing off in his father's arms—breathing collective sighs of relief and exhaustion.

Finally, Steve asked, "Anyone hungry? Mom and James won't be home for a while. Should I fix some—"

"That's okay," Ginny offered, jumping up before Steve could finish his sentence. "I'll start some chicken."

He chuckled. If there was one constant in his life, it was his inability to cook anything that could pass as food in any way. With Peggy practically running SHIELD by now, he was home in the evenings more often than she was, so his children knew firsthand the horrors of his kitchen ventures.

He kicked his feet up on the coffee table and drew his youngest son closer to his chest.

That paperwork could wait, he figured. He closed his eyes and listened to Anthony and Natalie speak in hushed tones about who-knows-what, like teenagers do, while the sounds of clanking pots traveled from the kitchen. Grant's breathing evened out, and his hand relaxed its grip on Steve's arm.

Though that nostalgia was fading, Steve's mind still traveled back temporarily to the years in the 21st century. He didn't regret them, and he might even have missed them . . . but that was his past now. He lived that life. He did his twelve years.

Opening his eyes, he caught a glimpse of the photo of himself and Peggy on their wedding day.

Yep, without a doubt, it was all worth it.

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