So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.
You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name along with a place to post suggestions.
Don't forget to check out the Photobucket album listed on my profile page too. (My apologies. I didn't realize FF removed the links. I have corrected the problem in what way I can, so for those who like the visual additions, feel free to check them out.)
DAY THREE
CHAPTER EIGHTY NINE
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1658 HOURS
QUINJET CARGO BAY
INTERNATIONAL WATERS
STEVE
There was a sort of infuriating comfort in the fact that 'hurry up and wait' even in this modern age I found myself in, was still a common practice. At 1506 hours they sighted the terrorist, the location was almost insulting. I 'just' finished fighting in Germany, and now it looks like a new enemy has decided to start another war there.
At 1522 hours we were in the air, a quinjet, one of the same kind of aircraft I arrived on the carrier in, was already prepared, the preparations for takeoff finished before we even had a location so when S.H.I.E.L.D found him we wouldn't waste time waiting.
They said even at mach 5, 5976 km/h it would take us almost an hour and forty minutes to reach the city at 1659 hours, 2259 hours in German time.
I had an hour and 40 minutes to sit and wait, and think. And all I can think about is her.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 7TH 2011
210 STANHOPE ST 11237
BROOKLYN NEW YORK
STEVE
It took me a moment to realize what the sound I was hearing was, and by the time I did I almost didn't reach the phone in time.
S.H.I.E.L.D gave my the the phone out of necessity they said, as well as a laptop computer, so they could communicate with me if they needed to but so far it hasn't rang once. Why would it when S.H.I.E.L.D didn't have Captain America back on active duty yet, and there was no one alive from my past anymore who would know to call.
Then I had this strange rhythmic chirp echoing in a muffled way around my apparent. I thought at first that it might just be a sound filtering through the wall from one of my neighbors, until I realized the reason it was muffled was because it was coming through the closed door of my bedroom.
By the time I did grab the phone off its dock I seem to have caught it at just the right fraction of a second to confuse the answering machine. I could hear its automated message "Hello, you have reached 718-535-3414, we are unavailable to take your call at this time, please leave a message after the tone" Tucked awkwardly under my unnecessarily forceful "DON'T HANG UP, I'M HERE, IT'S LYING!"
I can tell it's a woman's voice on the other side of the line, and that she is confused but that is all I recognize at first because her voice was overlaid by the the very sharp beep that suddenly assaulted my eardrums from two different directions. Thankfully she has the foresight to keep talking. "...Steve, are you ok?"
"Nora? Yes, I'm fine, it's just..." I meant to say more but the sound of my own voice repeating to me a half second behind threw me off for a moment, one which she seems to misinterpret. "Is this a bad time?
"No!" The forcefulness finds its way back in without me intending to, and I can practically hear her eyebrows furrow in the silence before I let out a frustrated sigh. "I just did...something... to the phone." The phone seems to have opinions about the situation as well when another sharp beep burrows into my eardrum again, supposedly marking the end of the time for the message. "I hate this thing. Are you still there?"
"Yeah, I'm still here." While I find that reassurance a relief I find my attention pulled to the sound of her voice. It sounds muffled now, as if she moved away from the phone for a second, or something was put over it. There is also the muted humming sound of another human voice, but one that sounds distinctly male.
"Nora?" While I can't hear her end clearly she can still hear me fine apparently. Her words, while still muffled reply to mine with a quick "One second Steve" Before she continues talking distantly to whoever she is with, saying something that has the word "change" in it before she finally returns to me, her voice crystal clear again as she is the one who asks if I'm still on the phone this time.
"Y-yeah..." My response comes out with a little hesitation as I look at the buttons in front of me, trying to figure out if there is one I can push to make the speakers stop projecting my voice back at me for this whole conversation, since it is only my voice and not her's. "Sorry, this phone is just confusing me again, did you need something?"
"No, not really, I'm just taking care of my to do list and I didn't want to loose you while I paid the delivery. What's your phone doing?" My answer of 'its greatest impression of me' draws a laugh out of her for a moment before she assures me that it's not broken and the echo will fix itself once I hang up.
"So how have you been?" Her tone tells me what she is really asking, it loses some of its laughter, sombering out but not drifting into pity, just the inquiry of a friend. "I've been alright." When I say I've been alright I am also saying there haven't been any bads days.
I would never lie to her about those, I learned very quickly I didn't have to hide them from her. She didn't see them as just something pitiful about me like everyone else, she wasn't just sad for Captain America, she understood, because she lived through 'bad days' of her own once. It's not something we bring up up deliberately, neither of us having any desire to dwell on the misery, but its something we don't avoid either if it needs to be talked about. We deal with them as they happen, we help each other.
"Thank you." Then remembering her mention a delivery I turn the conversation a little. "but if you're busy I don't want to be an inconvenience. Should I call you back later, or come by?"
There is another pause that fills my speaker, but in this one I almost swear it sounds like she stifled a giggle. "Oh please, when have you ever been an 'inconvenience' Steve? Besides if you did those, then I wouldn't have a thing to do but sit outside your door and wait."
There was going to be a response to that, until my brain processed the words 'outside your door'. Instead once they do I just turn and leave the living room to head down the narrow entry hallway off the kitchen. Even before I put my hand around the doorknob I can hear proof on the other side. She is humming, and I can definitely hear the smirk on her lips in that sound, a smirk I see as the door opens and I offer her one of my own.
"Hello Steve." I of course am not rude enough to skip greeting her back as I open the door farther for her, even if her appearance in my hall is a bit of a surprise. "Hello Nora."
She is dressed in an unusual manner, which is also saying she is dressed normally. Nora's personal sense of style isn't really that strange, when you compare it to some of the things I have seen people wear on the streets of Manhattan, it's just different then I am used to. It does seem to suit her though.
She is wearing a white t-shirt with a multi colored crest on it, the creatures are some sort of dragon or lion, it's hard to tell the way they are shaped, but in the crest is a VΛ and below it the letters RVCA.
Around her neck she has a bulky silk scarf that is a lime green and deep pink color, with at least half a dozen alternating patterns all meshed together in it. Over that to offer her some sort of protection from touch, but still not make her too hot in the late summer heat as a knit mesh cardigan jacket, with large holes between the weave. I can also make out under her scarf quite the collection of chains and beads around her neck. The chains are various sizes and have some trinkets attached to them, one peaking from the side appears to be a bird. The beads are in various sizes too, and many shades of purple.
Her jeans are, as usual, full of holes and worn out spots, and today are folded up to just below her knees. Her legs aren't bare though, she has a pair of thin striped socks on to protect her skin. Her footwear today is a pair of leather sandals, which have the straps made of various colorful pieces of rope.
Also on her are yet another pair of her almost ever present gloves. In private or when in familiar company she has begun to be able to leave them off sometimes, but out in public she still needs them all the time. Then last, but not least is the accessory I find the most interesting and amusing. A very worn out fedora that looks like it might have been made with brown burlap.
"How did you get here?" This is why finding her outside the door surprised me. While S.H.I.E.L.D no longer restricts Nora to the ground of the base she is stationed at, and even gave her own off base housing she very rarely ventures out in public on her own, given her encounter with a mugger last December and the fact that NYC is far too crowded for a person with a touching phobia to ever be comfortable, no matter how much control over their phobia they have. "I thought you were paying for a delivery?"
"Oh, I'm the delivery. I took a cab." She says it so casually despite the fact that I don't miss the way she rids herself of her hat and handbag, but not her coat, giving away that it wasn't as calm a trip as she lets on. But since her hands are steady as she does that its also not something I bring up, we both know the best way for her to get over her aversion of crowds is to be around them in limited amounts.
"If I knew you were coming over I would have tidied up a bit more." I meant that sincerely, thinking about whether or not my bedroom door was still open, and if she could see my laundry basket from this angle. Her open laugh draws my attention from that concern. "Yes, because if you weren't expecting me I might find a pencil out of place."
I have to concede that one because she is right. Growing up during the depression we never had many things, and with my mother sick like she was I always made sure to keep our apartment tidy so it wasn't in the doctor's way. Then when she was too sick to take care of me and I had to live at the orphanage for a while, keeping our area anything less then clean was a punishable offense. That habit followed me into adulthood when I ended up in the army, and became a permanent part of my everyday life. One that seems especially important when it comes to having a woman in my apartment. Speaking of... "So 'did' you need something?"
"No, not really." She says with a smile. "I just came to ask if you wanted to go out with me." This time my blush returns from its brief retreat, and about half a second later her eyes widen a little with realization at what she just said and a blush claims her cheeks too.
"Well, uh Nora..."
"I mean, that's not..."
"...You're a wonderful girl and everything..."
"...What I meant to say..."
"...I mean lady, not everything..."
"...It's just maybe, if you want to I mean..."
"...You're just you, which is wonderful and..."
"...Would you possibly like dinner?"
"…Dinner?!"
Both of us stop our frantic overlapping speech, her's driven by her need to correct the mistake in phrasing, and mine driven by my misconceptions.
That's one thing I have noticed with Nora, and to a degree I have gotten used to it, but occasionally it catches me off guard. She says it's because her first language was 'socially awkward' but sometimes she gets the words or saying wrong, though it has improved since she was allowed to leave and live off the base.
That's one of the downsides that came from S.H.I.E.L.D restricting her life like they did for so long. It didn't give her the opportunity to encounter certain social interactions. In this case how certain sentences, no matter how innocently intended, sound far too much like flirting.
While the idea that Nora was asking me on a date is uncomfortable, I do have to admit it's also just as endearing that a lovely woman is just as awkward at this as I am. I will never tell her that though.
"Yes, dinner, food, just food." She confirms as the blush coloring her naturally tan cheeks starts retreating back out of her skin. "I was wondering if you wanted to get something to eat, unless you had other plans?"
"No, no plans that can't wait" No plans period really. "We will just have to run to a grocery store because I don't have much here at the moment. Did you know what you wanted to cook?"
"Oh no, I didn't mean cooking. I meant a restaurant this time." That surprised me in a different way than before. If she was serious this would be the first time Nora actually wanted to go buy a meal instead of cooking it herself, not that I ever complained about it, because as far as I was concerned she was a better cook than the ones at the base who I was told had to have a culinary degree before they could even apply for the job. "Have you ever had Russian?"
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1659 HOURS
QUINJET CARGO BAY
INTERNATIONAL WATERS
STEVE
Russian? I am such an idiot. She took me to this picturesque little Russian restaurant called Mari Vanna that was decorated in all the trappings of an old world country manor. Doilies were on the table, tea and cakes were on the menu, picture frames covered entire walls, and all sorts of antiques right down to the carved dining room sets we sat in. But the real reason she chose this picturesque Russian restaurant wasn't the food so much as the day.
She said it was sister's day, and her sister wasn't around at the moment, she was out on a mission, but this place reminded her of her sister. She ordered a mixed berry Romanoff for dessert and made a toast with tea for her sisters safe return. Romanoff, because it reminded her of her sister!
"Agent Romanoff I..." The need to talk to you is cut off by her telling me "Captain, he has people on the ground, you're gonna need to jump."