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Rockefeller Center was done up in Christmas lights. Children shrieked with excitement as they skated around the rink, carols played from the speakers, and Natasha and Bucky were laughing as they made their way back from the hot cocoa cart.
Steve accepted the steaming cup that Natasha held out for him, smiling at her as their fingers brushed together. It had been a long time since he had seen her look so carefree. Taking a sip of the cocoa, he turned to his best friend.
“What do you think of New York so far, Buck?” he asked.
Bucky scrubbed the side of his face with his gloved hand. “It’s so bright,” he replied. He blushed as Steve and Natasha started laughing. “What? It is!”
Steve hadn’t felt this happy in a while. The last year had been hard. Once Bucky and Nat had started talking to Fury, SHIELD’s intel had finally started connecting the dots. Steve had been deployed almost immediately to hunt down Lukin and to wipe out any lackeys he had hiding away. Fury wanted to wipe the Red Room from the face of the earth, and Steve had no intention of letting anyone get away.
Once he and Tony had brought Lukin in back in May, Steve had started working with Bucky. Fury had decided that he would help separate the Winter Soldier from Sgt Barnes. Since only a few people knew that they were one and the same, it wasn’t proving to be too difficult. Fury wanted to be able to call on Bucky when the missions called for it, and Bucky finally agreed after Nat and Steve had worn him down.
Natasha had been a little harder to help once he had returned. She was still having episodes as recently as Thanksgiving, but she had learned to work through them the same way she did the first time she came to SHIELD. She spent a lot of time training at headquarters and, despite the recent injuries and the toll that had been taken on her mind, she was once again top marks in almost everything. They hadn’t been intimate in over a year, though, and even though she told him frequently that she loved him, Steve couldn’t help but feel that things between them had changed. Possibly too much.
Steve gently tucked his arm around Natasha’s waist, loving the feel of her against his side as the three of them walked around the Center. This was what life was supposed to be like, simple and happy and full of laughter with the two most important people of his life. He didn’t care about the weird, intertwining, decades-long history the three of them shared. He loved them; they were his family.
Later that night, back in Brooklyn, Natasha climbed into bed with him and nestled against his side. He absentmindedly stroked her shoulder as he read from a worn copy of The Fellowship of the Ring. After a while, Natasha adjusted, sitting up and looking at him.
“I love you,” she said matter-of-factly.
Putting the book down on the bedside table, he sat up on his elbows. “I know, Nat. I love you, too.” He couldn’t help but internally cringe at how scripted and automatic it sounded anymore.
Natasha seemed to be wrestling with something, and he almost wondered if she were having another episode. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes, and grabbed his hand. She wasn’t shaking or clammy, Steve noticed; no flashbacks.
Finally, she opened opened her eyes and looked at him. “Steven Grant Rogers,” she whispered, “I love you. I don’t deserve you, especially because I’m a mess and you’re amazing and you’re Captain fucking America and I’m…me.”
“Nat—”
“Marry me, Steve.”
Steve didn’t answer her. Instead, he leaned forward and wrapped his arms around Natasha’s waist, pulling her onto his lap. He slowly closed the space between them, waiting for her to signal that she wasn’t ready, but she never did. Moaning quietly as his lips touched hers, she positioned herself across his hips, legs wrapped around his waist. He wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, kissing and holding each other, but when he finally pulled away, he was aware that she was crying.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asked, thumbing the tears off her cheeks. “Nat, why are you crying?”
She smiled and waved her hand in the air. “You never answered me,” she said. “Was that just a way to distract me so I wouldn’t notice?”
Steve pressed his forehead against hers, their noses touching. “Natalia Alianovna Romanova, I would be honored to marry you.” He kissed her again, smiling at her relieved sigh. “I love you, Nat.”
Later, after they had made love, he watched her sleep, red hair and pale limbs against the dark sheets. The silver ring he had given her over a year ago glittered on her finger and a smile danced across her lips.
This was how it was supposed to be.