Honest
You never pretend with me
You're yourself and I notice
Regardless
For me it's been the hardest thing
Every move questioning

…

Oh, I'm giving up
I think it's gonna be a long night, long night
Oh, no matter what
I'm telling you everything, everything, till
Nothing's in between, nothing's in between us
Nothing's in between, nothing's in between us
Nothing's in between, nothing's in between us
All of my secrets till nothing's between us

- "Between Us" by SVRCINA

Steve pulled up in front of Leyla's house, his heart much lighter than it had been two days ago. The sun was bright, the birds were singing, and he'd had plenty of time to dwell on every moment of their date and anticipate the next one. There was still a thread of anxiety wound around his heart (what if she changes her mind?), but it wasn't tight enough to choke him. Putting on his suit jacket again, Steve picked up the bouquet of yellow and orange daffodils he'd carefully laid on the passenger seat, then headed up to the front door.

Just as he reached for the doorbell, the front door swung open. Leyla slipped out, peered back inside, then softly closed the door. She planted herself in front of it, crossing her arms and squinting up at him suspiciously.

"Um...hi," Steve said uncertainly, shifting the bouquet to his left hand so he could hold his right out for her to shake. "It's Leyla, right?"

Leyla ignored the hand. "So. You're Steve Rogers. Think you've got what it takes to make my girl happy?"

That sounded like a trick question. "Uh...yes?"

"Huh. Confident. So, what qualifications does Steve Rogers have to be Sharon Carter's boyfriend?"

Steve found himself clutching the bouquet in both hands like a shield. "Well...the only one that matters, I guess...is that she said yes."

For a moment, Leyla squinted up at him with a scowl, and Steve was sure he'd said the wrong thing. Then a slow smile spread across her face. "Okay, I like you. But!" Her face immediately snapped into a stern expression as she jabbed a finger at him. "If you break her heart, I'll rip your head right off your shoulders and feed it to my cat, and I don't care if you are a supersoldier!"

Steve opened his mouth to reply, but just then the front door opened again. "Leyla, what are you doing?"

Sharon stepped outside, looking between the two of them with a bemused smile. She wore black dress pants and a red top this time, and she'd kept her hair down, falling in gentle waves to her shoulders. Beautiful.

Leyla smiled innocently. "Just entertaining your boyfriend while you were getting ready."

"You weren't giving him the Talk, were you? That's what dads are for, Leyla!"

"Well, your dad wasn't handy, so someone had to do it!"

Sharon rolled her eyes at Steve, which reminded him to give her the flowers.

"You really didn't have to," Sharon said, smelling one of the large blossoms. But her smile as she looked up at him, face framed by cheery yellow and orange... Yes, he had to. He really did.

Leyla sighed as Sharon handed her the bouquet. "It's a good thing you live in Berlin, or I'd run out of vases real fast." She turned on the threshold and waved at them. "Have fun, you two!" Then, when Sharon turned her back, she made an I've-got-my-eyes-on-you gesture at Steve and closed the front door with a snap.

"Sorry about Leyla," Sharon said as they headed down to the car. "She can be a bit...much."

Steve chuckled. "Hey, it'll just make me less nervous if I ever do meet your father. Speaking of which, how are your parents?"

The ride to the restaurant went by fast, as Sharon talked about her weekend with family. She talked about the cute antics of her two-year-old nephew, her mother's ongoing trouble with migraines, and her father's eternal battle against the rabbits and deer that kept on decimating his vegetable garden. It was all so refreshingly normal.

Sharon had made the reservations this time. She'd chosen a sushi restaurant, a place that seemed fairly authentic to Steve's inexperienced eyes. The waitress led them to a private room with a short-legged table and cushions to sit on. They even had to take their shoes off before stepping onto the tatami mats covering the floor.

Steve wasn't very good at using chopsticks, and Sharon had to reach across the table a couple times to correct his grip so he wouldn't keep dropping things. He couldn't deny that his heart skipped a beat every time her fingers touched his, nor that he had to resist the urge to intentionally drop his chopsticks so she would keep doing it. Instead, he just chuckled at himself and enjoyed the sound of her laughter.

His heart was so light. There was none of the awkwardness of last time, no terrible secrets or worries holding him back. He could just relax and enjoy her company. They could tell jokes, share stories, laugh to their hearts' content. At least for a few hours, he didn't have to bear the full weight of his worry over Bucky and Jake. She lifted that burden from him a little more with every smile.

Once their meal was over, the waitress cleared the dishes from the table and brought them a bottle of warm sake. As he took his first sip, Steve realized that Sharon had grown rather quiet. She waited until the waitress stepped out of the room and slid the door closed, then drew a deep breath as though to steel herself for something.

"You know what we were talking about...last time?" Instead of looking at him, she was rummaging in her purse. It was different than the one she'd carried on their last date—bigger, almost like a book bag. "About your...little problem?"

"Yeah..." Steve's heart clenched a little with anxiety. This couldn't be good.

Sharon pulled a thick manila folder out of her bag. "I've been thinking about it a lot, and doing some research in my spare time." She paused for a moment as if to collect herself, then set the folder in front of him. "Have you ever considered getting a vasectomy?"

His cheeks felt hotter than the sake. He dropped his gaze to the folder and flipped it open, just so he wouldn't have to look her in the eye. "You mean...sterilization?"

"Yes," Sharon said. "If you're worried about getting someone pregnant, it seems the best thing to do would be to make that impossible in the first place. There are a couple different ways to get it done, and it's a minimally invasive procedure with a pretty quick recovery time, of course you'll probably recover even quicker than that, though you'll still have to get a few tests done to make sure it worked correctly, and it doesn't affect hormones at all, so you should be able to carry on normally after that, of course there's always the possibility of side effects, but—"

"Sharon." He cut into her nervous babble, which was getting faster and faster. Looking up from a brochure for a clinic in Brooklyn, he glanced up and saw that her face was bright red too. "You...looked all this up...this weekend?"

The folder was stuffed with not only information on what looked like the top ten places this procedure could be done in New York City, but also photocopied pages from medical textbooks with detailed diagrams, articles about the efficacy of the procedure, chances of failure, potential physical and psychological issues that might arise in the future...

Sharon shrugged. "I just thought you might like to know what your options are. I mean, I didn't have a whole lot of time to research it, so maybe you already looked into it and there's something I didn't realize..."

"No, I...never even thought of it before." He leafed through several more articles, trying to will the blush away. As if that had ever worked. "Funny," he commented mildly. "When I was growing up, there were certain people who would have said I should be sterilized even before the serum. So I wouldn't 'poison the gene pool.'"

"I'm sorry," Sharon said hastily. "I didn't mean...I hope this wasn't...offensive or..."

"No, it's fine." Steve closed the folder and gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "If I had been sterilized...maybe Project Legacy would never have come about..." He'd meant it as a bit of dark humor, but it didn't sound funny when he said it.

"You can't blame yourself for that. You had no way of knowing what they'd do."

"Yeah," he said heavily. "I know."

Silence fell for a moment. Before it could grow too oppressive, Steve tapped the folder and said, "Thanks for doing all this. I'll look into it."

Sharon smirked. "Well, it takes a few months to recover and make sure everything worked properly, so if you ever want to sleep with me, you might want to get on that."

Half-laughing, half-groaning, Steve dropped his burning face into his hands. "I think you picked the most elaborate way to proposition someone I've ever heard of..."

"Is it working?"

Steve looked up at her wry smile, her dark eyes twinkling with mischief... "Ask me again in a few months."

They gazed into each other's eyes for a second or two, until they both burst into laughter at the same time. "We're never going to have a date with a normal conversation, are we?" Steve chuckled, shaking his head.

"With you?" Sharon grinned. "Definitely not."

Steve sobered a little at that. "Are you sure you're okay with this? I doubt you thought you'd have to put up with this much when you started dating me..."

"Yes, Steve, I'm sure. I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it."

"Okay." It was impossible to doubt her, when she said it with such calm conviction.

She sighed. "You don't believe me, do you?"

Steve quickly shook his head. "I believe you, I just...I guess I don't understand why you didn't run away as soon as I said our relationship couldn't go that far."

Sharon smiled sadly. "If you hadn't said something, I would've had to eventually."

"What do you mean?"

Sharon hesitated, eyeing Steve as if sizing him up. Eventually, she seemed to make up her mind. "I need more sake for this," she muttered, reaching to pour herself another cup.

Steve noticed that her hands were trembling. "You don't have to say anything if you don't want to..."

"No...I wasn't planning on bringing this up just yet, but...I think you need to know." She took a gulp of her drink. "It's kind of a long story, though..."

Steve poured himself another cup as well. "I'll listen to anything you want to tell me."

Sharon took a deep, steadying breath, squared her shoulders, and met his eyes as she began her tale. "This was back when I first joined S.H.I.E.L.D. I was...a lot younger then. A lot more naive. But I met this guy. Kyle. He worked in the accounting department. We'd cross paths every now and then, chat a little bit, sometimes get lunch..."

Sharon's eyes drifted to the side, as if she could see this Kyle's face as she delved into her memories. "He was a very social person, really good at keeping conversations interesting. He worked a desk job, but he just seemed to know so much about so many different topics. And...okay, he was pretty good-looking too. The definition of 'tall, dark, and handsome.'" She grinned a little sheepishly.

"Best of all, he was interested in me. He always seemed to know the right thing to say. He made me feel...special. Fascinating. Like I was the center of his universe. And I was pretty crazy about him too. There was something almost mysterious about him. He said he didn't like to talk about himself much, but every so often he'd drop hints about this or that, just little mentions of something in his past. It would sound so interesting, but if I asked him about it, he'd say something like, 'Maybe I'll tell you one day.' Sometimes it would make me cry, wondering when he'd trust me enough to tell me everything." She shook her head at herself.

"It wasn't long before we were officially dating. And we'd only been dating a few months before Kyle asked me to move in with him. I was over the moon about it. I was in love with him, and I thought he loved me too. I thought...he was the one."

Something occurred to Steve at this point. "Kyle wouldn't happen to be that ex you were telling me about last time, would he?"

"Don't get ahead of the story!" Sharon scolded with a half-hearted smile.

"Sorry."

Sharon gulped down the rest of her sake and let out a shaky breath. "We'd been together for almost a year when I started noticing...some things. Like how he always had to be right. If I disagreed with him about anything, it was because I wasn't smart enough or I didn't know enough or I hadn't thought things through. Eventually, I stopped trying to argue with him, even when I was pretty sure I was right.

"And then he seemed less and less interested in spending time with me. At first I thought it was just that we were both busy with work, but even when we did both have free time, he seemed...bored. Distracted. Then there would be times when he'd want to do something—go out somewhere, or have an intimate night at home—but I'd be working on something or I'd just be too tired. And he'd...well, pout is the best way I can think to describe it." She smiled wryly. "He'd complain for a while, then he'd go off to bed in a huff. And once I was free and tried to make it up to him, he'd give me the cold shoulder. Like punishment for not being on his schedule."

The bitter smile on Sharon's face became more genuine as she continued. "I say I noticed these things, but really Leyla deserves the credit for noticing the warning signs first. She could tell something was bothering me, and when she finally wheedled some details out of me, she told me the last thing I wanted to hear: Kyle was cheating on me. She didn't have any evidence, just rumors, but when she heard what was going on at home...that convinced her.

"I didn't want to believe her, of course. Kyle was supposed to be the love of my life." Sharon gave a mirthless snort of laughter. "So to prove her wrong, I looked at his phone one day when he was in the shower. It didn't take me long to find his texts to a woman named Serena."

"He should've known better," Steve muttered, "with a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent for a girlfriend."

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Tell me about it. It was right out in the open; he barely even tried to hide it at all. Their texts were pretty explicit—dirty talk, plans to meet up when I was away for work. I didn't have much time to go through them all, but I didn't need to. It was perfectly obvious what was going on. They were laughing at me behind my back, and I had no idea."

With a firm shake of the head, as if to brush away the memories, Sharon continued, "Our anniversary was the next day, so that's when I confronted him about it. I waited until we got to the restaurant, and then I told him that I knew everything. I expected him to deny it at first, or at least to apologize...but he didn't do either. He laughed at me. He made me feel stupid for taking so long to figure it out, and then he said..." Her jaw clenched. "'If you were just better in bed, I wouldn't have to find anyone else.'"

Steve stared at her, appalled. "Please tell me you at least broke his nose for that."

She laughed a little. "I wish! No, I just stormed out. I went straight back to the apartment, packed up my stuff, and crashed at Leyla's place for a while. Kyle tried to call me several times, but eventually he gave up. I haven't spoken to him since."

Steve cursed softly. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that."

Sharon nodded. "It was...yeah, it was the worst time of my life. I was pretty torn up about it for a while. And once I really processed everything that he'd done, I made a promise with myself." She raised her head, meeting his eyes unflinchingly. "I'm not going to sleep with anyone again until they've signed their name on a marriage certificate. And believe me, after Kyle, it would take a lot before I trust someone enough for that. I threw my heart at his feet, and he trampled all over it. So before I give myself to anyone else...I want to be certain, one hundred percent, that it's not going to happen again. It's not that I don't trust you, but..."

"No, I understand," Steve assured her. "I respect that. Guess we both have our reasons to wait, huh?"

Sharon smiled, then gave a great shudder. Rubbing her bare arms vigorously, she groaned, "Ugh, talking about him always gives me chills..."

"Here." Steve shuffled around the table on his knees, pulling off his suit jacket and draping it over her shoulders. He settled down next to her as she pulled the jacket closed.

"Thanks." She looked up at him with a sad little smile that made his heart melt instantly.

He reached for her hand almost without thinking. Her fingers were ice-cold, so he took both of her hands in his and gently rubbed warmth back into them. "Thank you for telling me," he said. "That must have been hard to talk about."

Sharon shook her head. "I don't really like dredging up those memories if I can help it, but...Kyle is in the past. He can't hurt me anymore."

"You know," Steve said, "when you started talking about him, I was thinking I had a lot to live up to."

She grinned up at him. "But now you know that as long as you're not a lying, cheating turd, you're doing pretty good!"

"I think I can manage that," Steve laughed. He let his hands fall still, her fingers warm between his palms. "You're a brave woman, Sharon Carter."

Her eyes sparkled a little brighter at those words. "Why, for telling you about Kyle?"

"No, for dating a man who has even more issues than Kyle did."

Sharon glanced over at the folder still sitting on the table and leaned towards him, letting her shoulder rest against his. "I'd take your issues over his any day."

Steve just squeezed her hands in response.

When Steve opened the door for her, Sharon stepped out of the car, breathing in the cool evening air. As nerve-wracking as some of their conversation topics had been, Sharon didn't want this night to end.

Steve lingered on the sidewalk with her, apparently just as reluctant to say goodnight. "So...back to Berlin?"

"Yeah, I have a flight tomorrow afternoon."

Steve nodded. "Well...stay in touch, and let me know next time you're on this side of the Atlantic. I mean...if you want to see me again..."

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Yes, Steve, I want to see you again. What kind of girlfriend would I be if I didn't even want to see you? But next time, I want to meet Jake."

Steve's smile widened into a huge grin. "You'll love him. I know you will."

"I have no doubt."

For a moment, they just stood there smiling at each other, but they had to part at some point. "I should probably go..." she said reluctantly.

"Yeah." Steve hesitated, then stepped forward. "Good night, Sharon."

His arms wrapped around her in a warm embrace. She found her nose pressed against his shoulder, and when she breathed in, her lungs filled with the same scent she'd noticed when he lent her his jacket. "Good night," she murmured, closing her eyes to savor the moment.

He made her feel safe. Part of it was just being held by those strong arms, she knew, but it was more than that. He'd listened to everything she had to say, and he hadn't seemed offended or threatened by any of it. He just listened with sympathy and patience, until she felt like she could tell him anything. And, judging from the subject matter of their conversations, he felt the same way.

They pulled apart at last. "Text me when you get to Berlin," Steve said, gently squeezing her shoulder before stepping back. "I want to make sure you get home safely."

"Will do." She waved as Steve got into his car and pulled away.

Cheerfully swinging her purse (which was much lighter than it had been a few hours ago), Sharon hurried up the steps to Leyla's house. "I'm home!" she sang out, kicking off her shoes before breezing into the living room and flopping onto her back on the couch.

Leyla, who sat in the armchair by the window holding a book in one hand and petting Simon with the other, looked over with an amused quirk of her eyebrow. "I take it the date went well?"

"It was perfect," Sharon sighed, stretching her arms above her head. "He's perfect."

"Oh? Perfect, is he?"

"Just about," Sharon said, hugging herself. She knew she was wearing a stupid grin, but she couldn't help it. Her heart was prancing about like...like a foal let out into the field for the first time. That looked kind of silly too, but so joyful. A perfect description of how she felt.

"If you say so."

Something in Leyla's voice made Sharon prop herself up on one elbow. Leyla watched her over the top of her book with a guarded expression. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Leyla sighed, then stuck a bookmark in her book and set it aside. "I don't wanna burst your bubble or anything, but...I mean, you said the same thing about Whatshisface from Accounting."

Sharon sat up and said soberly, "Steve is nothing like Whatshisface."

Leyla shrugged. "I'm just saying, Whatshisface was hot and he took you to fancy restaurants and everything, but eventually you saw his true colors. So, like...just because he's Captain America doesn't mean he won't turn into Whatshisface eventually."

"Okay, time out. Can we please stop calling him Whatshisface? It's a lot easier to say—"

"Turdface!" Leyla said brightly. "I agree; that's much shorter."

Sharon burst out laughing, and Leyla joined in until Simon hopped off her lap in disgust. Even as she laughed, Sharon had to marvel at herself. Most of the time, she did her best to forget about Kyle and keep her thoughts far from him. But tonight, she had not only been able to talk about him at length, but also laugh about him. Even a few years ago, she wouldn't have been able to do that.

Once their laughter had dissolved into tears of mirth, Sharon sat up again from where she'd collapsed on the couch. "I'm serious, though," she said breathlessly, wiping her streaming eyes and hugging a pillow to her chest. "Steve is different."

Sharon closed her eyes, thinking of the way Steve had looked tonight as she'd told him her story. "In the beginning, Kyle was always so...mysterious. Like he was doling out all these hints and clues for me to figure out who he was, but he'd never just come right out and tell me anything. Steve...from day one, he's been up front about everything. He doesn't string me along, he just tells me things. About his past, about his worries and fears, about everything he's dealing with. Kyle would drop breadcrumbs, and each one would just be the tiniest scrap, but it would feel like a precious secret just because it was so rare. But Steve doesn't give me secrets, because he doesn't need to keep them from me. He has nothing to hide. What you see is what you get."

When she opened her eyes again, she found Leyla watching her with a soft smile. "Okay, you have my permission to fall head-over-heels in love with this guy. He sounds awesome."

"Gee, thanks," Sharon laughed.

"I'll let you have your fun as long as you let me be the suspicious stick-in-the-mud. After all, the last thing we need is The Return of the Turdface."

This time, they laughed until their sides ached and they couldn't breathe.

It was a long drive from Leyla's house back to the apartment, but Steve barely noticed the passage of time. He felt like he was floating, and nothing—not the folder he carried with him, not the worries about the other areas of his life—could bring him down. He had too much energy to stand around waiting for the elevator, so he ran all the way up the stairs, taking them three at a time.

Sam waited for him on the couch, watching TV with the volume turned down low. He raised a glass of something in salute, but Steve just waved a hand in greeting as he passed. After dropping off the folder in his room, Steve took off his jacket, tie, and shoes, then returned to the living room, collapsing in a contented heap on the couch.

Smirking, Sam switched off the TV and took a loud slurp of his drink. "Soooo? How'd it go?"

Steve grinned and tucked his hands behind his head. "Perfect. She's perfect."

"Okay." Sam made a show of getting comfortable, pulling out the footrest and crossing his ankles. "Get it out of your system, then. What's so perfect about her?"

"Everything?" Steve shrugged helplessly. "She's beautiful—her eyes are just...and when she smiles... And she's smart, and so confident. I'm stumbling over my tongue the whole time, and she always seems to know exactly what to say. Just being around her, I feel like...I could do anything."

"Sounds like someone's twitterpated!" Sam sing-songed.

But Steve didn't care. "I think I'm in love," he sighed blissfully.

"You are so full of cheese," Sam laughed. "I hope you know you're adorable."

"Laugh all you want," Steve said. "Sharon is amazing, that's all there is to it."

"I'm happy for you, man," Sam chuckled. "Hope it works out."

"It's like she's not fazed by anything," Steve said. "She's not fazed by...me. It doesn't matter how much I tell her about me, or all the craziness that is my life. She's not even bothered that I'm a 97-year-old retired single father whose best friend is accused of blowing up the U.N.!"

Sam laughed aloud at that. "Yup! She's a keeper, all right!"

Of course, Sam didn't even know the half of it. How many women would listen to his explanation of where they had to draw the line, so close to the beginning of their relationship, and respond with a weekend of research instead of running for the hills? Her first response was sympathy, her second was trying to find a solution, and her third was opening up about the worst time in her life.

Sharon Carter was one in a million.

Let me hear in the morning of your steadfast love,
for in you I trust.

- Psalm 143:8