I'm back! Sorry it's been a hot minute! This chapter went through 3 different drafts, not even counting the OG first draft I wrote up a long while ago, but it's finally done! Hope y'all enjoy, and hopefully this isn't the only update this year (I say as the one who has total control over that, oop)
Chapter Eight: All Things End
Maggie and May returned to the apartment in the early afternoon to find Daisy sitting at the kitchen table, a small square of canvas and a set of acrylic paints in front of her. The old speaker blasted the radio from the half-wall. Daisy bobbed her head to the beat as she painted.
"Hi, Daisy-doodle," said May, dropping a kiss on the top of her head before heading to the fridge to make sandwiches. "Where's your brother?"
"Internship," Daisy said without looking up from her work.
"That boy's all over the place these days. Turkey or roast beef, Maggie?"
"Turkey, please."
Daisy didn't protest when Maggie cautiously slid onto the bench across from her. Maggie tilted her head to peek at the canvas. Daisy had painted a mountain range against a brilliant sunset backdrop. The detail was incredible — the white crests of the waves, the swirls of pink and white that came together to form the clouds, the reflection of the glowing sun on the sides of the mountains, the silhouettes of birds in the sky.
Daisy's arm shifted, blocking her view. Maggie tore her gaze from the painting and found Daisy staring at her.
"Sorry!" she said hastily. "I didn't mean— I just.… It's beautiful."
Daisy bit her lip, her eyes narrowed. Shame stabbed through Maggie's chest. Did she think Maggie was making fun of her? Had they really been so callous that she would see a genuine compliment as a barb?
Maggie thought of Ben. Of the weight Daisy's black hole must've been leaving on her shoulders.
She pushed through her discomfort and asked, "You did this yourself?"
Daisy nodded.
"You didn't trace it or anything?"
"Well, I followed a tutorial," Daisy admitted, waving her paintbrush at the video playing on her phone, "but yeah."
Maggie sucked in a breath. "That's incredible." And she really meant it.
Their eyes met, and something strange happened.
Maggie had looked at Daisy hundreds of times in the last few weeks. Returned every glare and eyeroll the other girl gave with just as much displeasure, if not more. But for the first time, she noticed the tiny smears of gold nestled in the warm brown of her irises, and Maggie's heart gave a little flutter.
Daisy let her arm relax. Her lips pulled into the smallest smile, just at the edges, and she tucked an errant lock of dark hair behind her ear. "Thanks. I'm actually in the Art Club at school. I can't take any classes this year because I don't have the electives to spare, but… I'm hoping next year I can get into the Portfolio Prep course to start getting ready for college."
"College?" Maggie echoed.
Was it her imagination, or was Daisy blushing? "I wanna be an art teacher, so I have to develop a well-rounded portfolio for my applications. It's pretty much the deciding factor for a lot of programs."
"And yours is going to be amazing," May assured her, swooping in with sandwiches for both of them. "Any school you apply to will be lucky to have your talent, baby."
If Daisy hadn't been blushing before, she definitely was now. She tried to wave off the praise, but it was clear how pleased she was to hear it.
"'Course, you kids have to get through sophomore year before you can think too much about college," May reminded them, "so maybe let's focus on that first, huh?"
Considering sophomore year meant Maggie's first year of public school, yeah, she needed to concentrate on that before life after high school for sure.
Maggie and Daisy shared a smile over the table, and a spark of something she couldn't quite name lit up her chest. It was warm and comforting and she hoped it would live there forever.
For the first time ever, she and Daisy sat in companionable silence as they ate lunch. Daisy added a few extra touches to her painting, which she told Maggie was just for fun, not for her portfolio. She even answered Maggie's question about a song on the radio without making her feel stupid for not knowing. Maggie tried to savor this tenuous peace between them; she didn't know how long it would last.
Miraculously, the rest of the afternoon passed without any hostility. Satisfied with her work, Daisy packed away her supplies and gave the painting to May, who placed it right next to a picture of Ben in one of the bookcases in the den. Maggie retreated to the guest room not long after. The strain of her early morning and the conversation with May had finally begun to hit her.
Stopping only to take off her Converse, Maggie crawled into the bed, pulled the covers over her head, and let herself miss Aunt Peggy and Della and her family. The pillow grew damp under her temple. She curled in on herself and allowed the black hole to consume her as she fell into a restless sleep.
An hour later she stumbled from the guest room, sweat-slicked skin shining in the fluorescent lights. Daisy and May were calling to her through miles of cotton, but all she could hear were Ross's jeers and Aunt Peggy's soft voice and Steve Steve Steve—
Her feet carried her out the front door, down the hall, up to the roof. The sticky summer air clung to her clammy skin. She sucked in a deep breath, then another. Tried to remember Dr. Rollins' advice through the remnants of her nightmares.
"I was wondering when you'd come up here."
Maggie jerked to face the unexpected voice.
A lean figure dressed in black leggings and a dark gray hoodie rested their elbows against the railing lining the edge of the roof, tucked behind the maintenance door. Bleached blonde hair in a curtain down to her chin. She pushed off the railing and turned, and recognition hit Maggie like a punch from the Hulk.
"Nat?" she croaked.
"Hey, Mags," Natasha said.
Maggie blinked hard. She ran a hand up into her rat's nest of hair and tugged. Pain shot across her scalp. Natasha was still there, giving her that sly, knowing smile, like they'd just successfully pulled a prank on Sam and he was none the wiser.
"What—" Maggie shook her head. "What are you doing here?"
"Could ask you the same thing," she replied.
"H-How did you—" The end of the question sat heavy on her tongue. How did you find me? Instead, she said, "Were you spying on me?"
"I've been keeping an eye on you," Nat said, which didn't answer the question entirely.
"Why?"
The maintenance door scraped across the concrete, and Daisy poked her head out. Her eyes searched Maggie up and down, brows knitted. "Are you okay, Maggie? You kinda freaked us out a little, running out like that. May was worried."
Maggie could barely speak around the knot lodged in her throat. "I'm fine."
Daisy raised a skeptical brow but didn't push. She glanced around the roof. "Were you talking to someone out here? I thought I heard another voice—"
"No, now can you leave me alone?" Maggie barked.
The hurt that flashed across Daisy's face ripped through Maggie with the drag of a serrated knife edge. Daisy scowled. "Whatever, Cali Girl."
She let the door slam shut.
"Who was that?" Natasha asked, emerging from her hiding spot again.
Maggie shook her head and asked again, "Why were you watching me?"
Nat answered, "I wanted to make sure you were okay."
Maggie felt a muscle twitch in her jaw. Her voice turned harder than vibranium. "It's been over a month."
At length, Nat admitted, "Ross found out I let Steve and Barnes go at the airport, so I had to lay low. Then some… other things came up. I wanted to check on you before now, Mags, but I didn't think Tony would take too kindly to me showing up unannounced at the compound even without Ross on my ass."
"All I'm hearing is excuses," she spat.
"I tried, Maggie—"
"You didn't do shit. You let them take me!" she snapped. Natasha winced, and Maggie felt a cruel sense of satisfaction. "Ross threw me in that goddamn cell and you didn't do shit!" Indignant anger roared through her. "Do you have any idea how fucking scared I was? They put me in prison while my whole family was falling apart and nobody gave a single damn about me, especially not you!"
Natasha looked down at her boots. Maggie had never seen her look guilty before, but there it was, stark in her curled shoulders and caved chest. "You're right," she said quietly. "I should've done more."
Maggie heard the apology woven in her words. A month ago, it would've healed the wounds left by that day. Now, it only enraged her more. Her hands shook so violently at her sides she wondered if she was at the center of her own personal earthquake.
She watched Natasha, watched the way her throat worked as she swallowed, her lips turning white as she pressed them in a thin line.
"Why are you really here?" Maggie demanded.
Natasha looked at her long and hard before she confessed, "…To say goodbye."
"Goodbye?" Maggie echoed, taken aback.
"Ross isn't going to stop looking for me until I'm on the Raft or dead, and I don't think he's picky about his choices," she explained. "So it's time to do what I'm good at — disappear."
Maggie's brain struggled to process this. "Where will you go?"
Natasha shrugged. "The Raft, first. You and I both know Sam and Wanda don't deserve to be there any more than you did. Steve has a plan. After that, who knows?"
"What— what about Della and Clint?"
"Clint took a plea deal," she said. "He's on house arrest, but he's with Laura and the kids. They didn't have the grounds to hold Della like the others, so she got out not long after you. I don't know where she is now."
Good, Maggie thought. Knowing at least Della and Clint weren't still stuck in that hellhole made her feel marginally better. She didn't ask how Natasha and Rogers would get the others out. She didn't want any part of it.
"So I guess this is it, then," Maggie said.
The bitter taste it left on her tongue surprised her.
Maggie hated Natasha. For what had happened in Leipzig. For Natasha's inability to stop it. For leaving her on the Raft. For not fighting for her.
But there was still love there, too, pulsing through her veins, shattering her heart at the thought of never seeing one of her oldest friends again. She would always love Natasha Romanoff, in spite of it all. If grief was love with no place to go, what did that make love tainted by resentment? Tainted by anger and sorrow and joy and confusion and hatred but still love, damn it?
"It doesn't have to be," Natasha said. "You could come with me."
Maggie took a step back. "What?"
Nat studied her with an intensity that caught her off guard. "You're scared, Mags. Running from something. I don't know the full story, but I can tell you you're not going to outrun it here in New York. I'll bet anything if Ross doesn't have eyes on you already, he will soon enough. Bastard's just spiteful enough I wouldn't put it past him." Her green eyes searched Maggie's. "If you're gonna run, you might as well do it with people who understand. With your family."
For one impossible second, Maggie imagined it: leaving with Natasha, disappearing again. Becoming a shadow in the world. No more pressure to live up to her surname, no more expectations, no more constraints on where she could go or who she could be. What would that kind of freedom taste like?
But even as she thought it, she knew the reality of the choice in front of her would never live up to her fantasy. What about Dad? What about school? What about May and Peter? Daisy?
Could she really leave all of that behind, return to the world she'd been trying to escape? Because Natasha and Sam and Wanda — they were all heroes to their core, and they would keep fighting no matter where they were or what the law said.
"No," she said.
Natasha raised a brow.
"Nat, I'm— I'm tired," she admitted. "I'm tired of the worry and the fear and never knowing what the hell's going to happen next. Being surrounded by gods and spies and superheroes and just being… me." The weariness hit her all at once, and she fought back the tears pricking at her eyes. "For once in my life, I wanna be a regular kid. Not a Stark. Not the stupid little girl trailing after the Avengers. Just… just normal. And I can actually do that here. I can be anybody I want because I'm finally a nobody."
Natasha's gaze held a soft kind of sadness at its edges. "You'll always be a Stark, Maggie. You can stay here and pretend to be someone else all you like, but that won't change who you are. You're Tony's kid, whether you like it or not."
Maggie wanted to scream because that was never the problem — it was everything attached to being her father's daughter. Instead, she forced herself to take a long breath.
"Maybe," she conceded. "But why shouldn't I be allowed to pretend? After everything I've been through? Why shouldn't I be allowed to have this one thing?"
For a long minute, Natasha said nothing. Maggie couldn't get a read on her, until eventually Nat nodded, solemn but reassuring. "You should."
Silence fell across the roof, underpinned by the early evening traffic creeping along the street below. Maggie didn't want to be the one to break it. Because breaking this silence, she knew, would mean goodbye.
But it was Natasha who moved first. She closed the distance between them in quick, efficient strides to grab Maggie into the most comforting, most heart wrenching embrace either of them had ever shared. Maggie poured seven years of memories into that hug — of laughter, tears, frustrations, fear, love — in the hopes that when she pulled away, they would no longer haunt her.
"Take care of yourself," Natasha murmured in her ear.
Maggie screwed her eyes shut, clung to Nat's hoodie a little tighter, felt her shattered heart break again. "I will."
And when Maggie returned to the apartment, numbly aware of Daisy's renewed glares, she did just that. She picked up those broken pieces, locked them away deep in her chest, and promised herself she would never let anyone hurt her like that again.