Author's Note: Thank you, thank you to everyone who reviewed last chapter. I was so glad to see that everyone was happy! Or fanning themselves. Or both. This is my first M rated story so I was a tiny bit nervous. First time jitters and all. ;)

So, now, we ironically get to deal with the consequences even if it's 60 years later. Fun!

Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel.

Chapter 13: Present

He remembers what happened in Prague.

It comes to him on a run. There's a trail that meanders through the trees around the cabin, a forgotten hunting trail that stretches five miles from start to finish. It's a decent workout, enough to get his blood flowing, and a brilliant way to clear his head. Figures he gets hit with the memory on mile twelve, right when he's in his stride, and nearly falls on his damn face in shock.

He remembers following her through the market with his scope, watching her hair not only to gauge the wind but because he was mesmerized by how the curls danced over her shoulders. He remembers wiping frosting from her lip and the taste of cherries. He remembers guiding her through the shot like a patient lover. He remembers the flirtation that did little to disguise the crippling tension between them. He remembers Natalia being so brutally, beautifully honest. He remembers admiring her for it and hating her for it.

Because he also remembers his own fear. Fear for her, for himself, for the consequences if they were found out. How completely stupid he'd been to put it all aside. Stupid but . . . in love.

He hadn't realized it then, but James knows it now. And it's a funny realization to come to, that as an amnesiac brainwashed assassin he's now capable of hindsight, that he finally has enough of a semblance of memory to recognize love. And he'd loved Natalia. Even with just the one memory, he knows.

There's a small pond just off the trail, and he sits on the grass that's damp with morning dew and thinks. Three months. Almost four. That's how long he's been at the cabin with Natasha. Four months of living with another human being. Four months of learning about someone through experience rather than words on paper or surveillance. It's exhausting and challenging but so completely brilliant.

Every morning he makes her coffee, and she's always too grumpy and out-of-it to be thankful until her third cup when she gives him that little smile. He looks forward to that smile. Sometimes she sings Ella Fitzgerald under her breath while she cleans her guns, and when he stops to listen to her she always arches her eyebrow challengingly even as her eyes glow with quiet pleasure. When she sings "Sweet and Slow", he knows it's for him. Then there are the times when she comes downstairs in the mornings wide awake but withdrawn, her eyes pale and faraway. Those are the mornings when she ignores her coffee and grabs a bottle of vodka instead. Yet she still sets out two glasses. One for her, and one for him, and he always joins her.

James picks up a stone and skips it across the length of the pond. He'd loved Natalia then, and his mind—his scattered, broken mind—can't help but wonder if he loves her now. It seems silly. Surely he can't. He's too fucked up. His mind is a mess, and his emotions are arguably messier. He's never sure if what he feels is real, if it's really him or if it's just a memory. If he's learned anything, it's that emotions have memories, too.

The sun continues to rise and James continues to stare at the water. The light winks on the surface like glass in the sun, and he tosses another pebble into the water. That's how Natasha finds him—metal arm glinting in the light, leaning back, ready to throw. She sits next to him and watches the rock skip across the surface until it flies into the brush on the opposite bank. James rests his arms on his knees as he glances at her, but she only gives him the slightest smile before leaning back and raising her face toward the sun. She closes her eyes with a quiet sigh, and his lips twitch.

"Gonna wait me out, huh?" he says as he returns his gaze to the water.

Natasha hums. "Nothing gets by you, does it?"

They pass hours in the sun until the tip of Natasha's nose begins to turn pink. James lies on his back after half an hour and closes his eyes, hoping that his mind will drift and not be entirely aware of Natasha's every movement and the way her hair burns bright in the sun. No such luck, since Natasha eventually (inevitably) decides to push him by using him as a pillow, laying her head on his stomach. His muscles tense briefly as flashes of Prague appear in his mind, and yet those flashes are ultimately how he relaxes.

He remembers this.

Finally, Natasha turns her head. "Okay, I know I said I'd wait, but I'm burning, here."

"You came after me," he says.

"Not the first time."

Odessa. He remembers that, too. "I shot you," he says. "Twice."

"I remember."

"You always invite people who've shot you to your safe house?"

"Living with a corpse sounds pretty boring."

They're quiet for another moment before he finally says, "I remember Prague."

Natasha takes the news without reacting. She's calm, unfazed. And for the most part, that's honest. Logically she expects this. She wants this. She doesn't like knowing more of their history than James. She wants to be on a level playing field. Yet there's a small part of her that panics for the very same reason. She's a spy. She's the best. And one of the reasons she's the best is because she always, always, has the advantage. The more James remembers, the more that advantage dwindles.

"What'd you think?" she asks.

"We were idiots."

"Yes."

"But," he pauses. "It was human. I was human."

Natasha rolls off of him, propping herself up on her elbows in the grass so she can look at him. "That why you're out here staring at the water?"

"I remember going out to the docks in Brooklyn or out to the bridge," he says. "I'd stand there for hours some nights, just watchin' the boats and the lights on the water. Helped me think."

"And what are you thinkin' about now?"

"Emotions are a pain in the ass."

Natasha laughs. "They do complicate things."

"How do you separate your past from now?"

"This is the part where I tell you how I became Natasha Romanoff, isn't it?" she asks rhetorically with a sigh. "Well, soldat, sorry to disappoint, but I didn't separate anything. I took the parts of myself that I wanted, and created whatever else I needed to be to survive." She looks down at the grass with a wry smile. "I've worn so many masks," she says. "I don't know if any of them is actually me."

He smiles slightly. "Well, if it counts, I like this one."

Natasha thinks she could have kissed him then and there, damn the consequences. Because they're talking about so many things at once, and she understands what's not being said, what James is trying to tell her—he doesn't know if what he feels for her, now, is real or a product of the past. He wants to know if she's managed to figure it out. And she's honest.

She hasn't. She can't.

And James accepts it. He accepts her.

It's such new territory for her, being so open. Honesty doesn't come naturally to her, and she feels so damn raw and exposed, but if this is what she gets out of it—this acceptance, this smile—it's worth it. Because she just admitted without words that she feels something for James, that she's not fighting it, and he'd smiled.

Natasha realizes that it's complicated. She realizes that nothing has been decided. Neither are willing to push too far at the moment, to test something that both remember but aren't sure is still there, but they're willing to let it rest, to be patient. That's all either can handle, but it's enough. It's more than enough.

"It counts," she says softly.

They spend another few minutes in the sun before Natasha cracks a joke about being able to fry an egg on his arm. By the time they hike back to the cabin, the sun is beginning to fall in the sky, both are exhausted from the sun and their conversation, and neither are in the mood to cook. So Natasha just takes the gallon of chocolate ice cream from the freezer, grabs two spoons, curls up on the couch, and starts a Doctor Who binge on Netflix. She wordlessly leans into James's side. His left arm rests on the back of the couch while the other fights her for the ice cream, knocking her spoon with his for the best bites until she hammer punches him in the gut.

It doesn't hurt, necessarily, but it certainly makes her point.

He smiles and leans deeper into the couch with a sigh as he tries to follow along with the show that she insists is better than Star Trek, and just as he starts to complain about how a phone box is too damn small to be a spaceship, the camera shows the console room, and he says, "Holy shit, it's bigger on the inside."

Natasha has never laughed harder in her life.

They fall asleep together on the couch. James is the first to shut his eyes, his chin dropping toward his chest, and his hair falling to shield his face. Natasha smiles to herself as she gives in to the urge to nuzzle his chest before switching to a new show. She spends the next three hours sorta-kinda watching Parks and Rec. For the most part she pays attention to James's even breaths and the way he occasionally twitches in his sleep. His arm whirs behind her head once and she tentatively puts her hand on his chest. "Vy ne odinoki, soldat. YA zdes'. YA zdes'."

James blearily blinks his eyes open, not even half-awake. "N'talia?" He huffs before tugging her closer to him as he stretches to lay out fully on the couch. Natalia stares at him with wide, stunned eyes as he wraps one arm around her, his metal hand cradling her hip while the fingers of his flesh hand briefly card through her hair. He sighs contently and kisses the top of her head. "YA mechtal o tebe," he says.

I was dreaming about you.

Then he's asleep again and Natasha can only lay her head on his shoulder and stare at the TV. Waking him up by moving would only lead to awkwardness. There's a chance he'll remember what he said, and after their conversation earlier, knowing he's hardly ready to admit what he feels, she doesn't want to make him feel as if she's waiting for him.

And she's not.

Of course, that doesn't keep her from falling asleep.

Her dream begins like always. She's on the gurney again, looking up at the lights over her head, rolling endlessly toward the doors to the operating theater. It's easier to get free, only the dream doesn't change like last time. Natasha pauses as she examines the hallway, cautiously extending a hand toward the wall and then jerking it back when she feels cold metal. It feels real. Too real.

She swallows. Logically, she knows that it's just a dream. None of it is real, yet she can't shake the feeling that it once was real. This is a memory. She knows it.

And there's only one memory that she doesn't have.

Natasha takes a deep breath and takes a step toward the doors that she never reaches on the gurney. The distance shrinks. She pauses again, but only for a second, and then she's striding with more confidence than she feels toward the doors until she's running. The closer she gets, the clearer the screams become.

"James!"

She tries to burst through the doors.

They don't give.

Natasha curses as she lands hard on the floor. She leaps to her feet. "James!"

She bangs on the doors in frustration before taking a step back and drawing her sidearm. She fires off an entire clip at the thick chains keeping the doors shut, but each shot pings uselessly off the metal. "Goddammit," she hisses. "James!"

She hits the door again, hears her knuckles crack, and hits it again.

"Natalia!"

The screams change. Higher. Natasha shudders and winces. She claps her hands over her ears as the screams get louder. Her voice is weak. "James!"

"Natalia!"

Her body begins to burn, and god, her head.

"Natalia!"

A jolt runs through her, and her eyes snap open.

"Natalia. Hey, malen'kiy pauk. Breathe."

Her chest hurts. Breathe? She gasps.

"C'mon, Natalia. Look at me." He holds her face in his hands, forcing her to look at him. "Breathe," he says firmly. "It's you and me."

James waits and hopes as she stares sightlessly at him, her eyes frantically scanning his face, pleading with him to help, and he's fucking trying, but he can't do it for her. "Natasha," he says. Her anglicized name feels weird on his tongue, but she blinks at him. "It's just you and me, sweetheart. So do us both a favor and breathe."

Natasha closes her eyes and forces herself to take a deep breath and hold it. She's done this before countless times. She knows how this works. She can do this. It's easier if she keeps her eyes closed. Her brain can only process so much, and her senses are scattered. She feels James. His hands on her face, his skin under her nails. The TV is still playing. She smells the lavender candle she'd lit on a whim.

"My head." Her throat is raw. "I . . ." She winces.

James curses under his breath as understanding dawns. "You need a drink," he says.

She huffs. It's supposed to be a laugh.

Her eyes open again, and James's familiar, haunted concerned eyes are what she sees first. His hand still cradles her face, and his thumb absently caresses the apple of her cheek. Then she looks at him harder. Her hand goes to his jaw, fingers gently tracing the thin, bloody lines that mar his stubble. "Sorry," she says.

James smiles faintly. "I've had worse."

She waits for him to get up. When he doesn't, she realizes that she's straddling him, and not in the fun way. Her thighs have a death grip on his hips that can't be comfortable. She releases him. His lips twitch.

Natasha gets up stiffly, her muscles far too tense. She retrieves a bottle of vodka and two glasses, dropping them onto the kitchen table carelessly and sloppily pouring the alcohol. The first drink goes back without a thought. She doesn't even feel the burn. She knocks back the one she'd poured for James. It doesn't help. She refills both glasses.

James watches her carefully. "You might wanna sit down."

Natasha sits down and throws back her third shot. She swallows slowly, closing her eyes at the comforting, familiar burn she can finally feel. James sits next to her but doesn't reach for the shot she'd poured for him, both not wanting it and not entirely sure she doesn't plan to drink it. He watches her carefully, not bothering with subtlety. Her hands shake, although she's so controlled that it's hardly more than an occasional twitch. Her eyes are red-rimmed, her cheeks damp and stained with mascara, her hair flat on one side of her face. He's never seen Natasha so . . . small.

She looks tiny sitting there in her chair. Hunched over with haunted, confused eyes. He wonders if this is what she thinks when she finds him like this, that he looks lost and abandoned and so goddamn hurt. He wonders if she looks at him and feels the same cruel wrench in his chest as he does now. "Natasha," he repeats her anglicized name again. It seems to ground her in the present.

Her eyes wearily meet his. She gives him a pitiful smile. "The whole repressed memory thing," she says, "not fun."

James sighs and steals a shot glass and the bottle. "No," he agrees. "Wanna start a notebook?"

"Hmm, we could be a twisted version of pen pals."

"Do people even write letters anymore?"

Natasha laughs just a little, or she tries, but the sound catches in her throat. She sips her drink. "It always starts out the same, like before," she admits. James nods, remembering the first time she'd had the dream. "I'm on the gurney, about to graduate. The doors are at the end of the hall, but I never reach them. I just roll along." The corners of her lips turn. "Just not this time. I got off the gurney. There were screams, and they just got louder and louder and louder the closer I got to the doors." She looks down.

James does, too. "You don't have to tell me," he says.

"I know."

He looks up.

"All this time, I thought those screams were yours, but they're not." That tiny, humorless smile is back. "They're mine."

The admission hurts both of them. Natasha knows that her mind doesn't entirely belong to her. Oh, she's too aware of that fact. She has a whole life of false memories to prove it, but now, just like years ago with Clint, she's confronted with the truth of it. And it hurts. It fucking hurts. Not only does she have to deal with the fact that the memory was stolen, but she also has to confront the memory itself. She isn't sure which is worse.

James watches the emotions flicker in her eyes. He can't read all of them, but he thinks he gets the most important ones. Fear. Anger. Sadness. Frustration. What kicks him in the gut is that he understands. And that's new. It's always been Natasha understanding him. This is the first time that he understands her. This is the first time he's understood anyone in so damn long. And he hates it, because he hates what it means.

It means that Natasha feels like he does, and he'd never wish that one anyone. Especially her.

"Did it all come back?" he asks. "I never . . . it's always pieces."

"No," she shakes her head, "there's something missing." She winces and rubs her temples. "Fuck, my head feels like it's been fried."

James takes a drink. "It'll fade after an hour or so," he says quietly as Natasha drains the rest of her glass and stands.

"Well," she says. "I'm gonna go to bed. Or try, anyway." Only she doesn't immediately head for the stairs. Natasha stares at James pointedly. "You're coming with me."

James blinks in surprise. "And that's a good idea?"

She wants to joke like she normally would—flash him a smile and keep her voice low. Absolutely.

But she doesn't smile, and her voice cracks. "I may be the one screaming, but I'm still trying to get to you," she says. "I just . . . I need to be sure you're alright."

James still isn't sure it's a good idea. This morning feels far away. He doesn't know if he can separate his feelings now from his feelings from the past. He truly doesn't even know if he wants to separate his feelings or ignore them completely. But he can't deny that in this moment, he's feeling.

Protective. Hurt. Angry. Compassionate.

And it's all because of Natasha. He wants to keep her safe because she was hurt. He's hurting because she was hurt. And he's angry. The girl in Prague that he'd known, so sweet and open and bold, she hadn't deserved this, and when he looks at Natasha standing in front of him now with hesitant eyes, he sees shades of the Natalia he remembers, and his answer slips from him without much more thought, "You don't snore, do you? I don't remember that yet."

Natasha's lips twitch. "I don't know. No one's dared to tell me."

They quietly go upstairs, Natasha leading the way, neither saying a word. Natasha is inwardly panicking and yet sure in her decision. She . . . she needs this. She needs him close. Her hands are still shaking, but she refuses to clench them into fists, and god, she's never had a headache quite like this one. And James . . . she remembers him doing this for her. She remembers being hurt on missions and him sneaking into her quarters to judge her wounds for himself. She remembers him kissing them better and she remembers giggling when he blew a raspberry on her bellybutton.

And she's never had that before, that kind of love and gentleness—even in her memory—until now.

Natasha misses it.

It's not awkward climbing into bed with James. Natasha takes the left side just as she normally would, and he wordlessly takes the right. There's none of the stuttering and blushing and chivalry that she had dealt with when she and Steve had been stranded in Brussels overnight in a cramped hostel with what hardly constituted as a twin bed. But it's different with James. They understand each other.

When they wake up the next morning, Natasha is halfway on top of James—leg hooked over his hips, arm over his chest, face buried in the crook of his neck. James is turned slightly toward her, his nose in her hair, his arm around her. They both lie still for a moment until Natasha sighs and nuzzles closer, shutting her eyes again. James starts to absently trace a path on her hip.

He can't remember a time he ever felt so warm.

Guh, feels. That's how you OTP.

So . . . yeah, things are heating up on the romance front. Certainly in the past. Now in the present. It's funny how time really doesn't change anything, isn't it?

But we all know how the story goes, don't we? We're more than halfway through this story, so prepare for angst as the end draws near. We've still got that one memory left to uncover, and we all know what it is.

Alrighty, let's see . . . Nat gets the line from the next chapter.

Preview from Ch14

Natalia - "You're not going anywhere, soldat."

See you Friday!

-AC