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Natasha, personally, is not typically big on parties. She thrives at them, sure; can charm and flirt with every guest until they’re absolutely enamored with her in some way or the other before flittering on to the next one, sipping champagne and looking every bit elegant and poised in an overpriced evening gown. But technically, that person isn't her. That person is the Black Widow. Natasha Romanoff? She loathes parties; would rather be at home, curled up on her couch and watching TV.
So, yeah, when she receives a thick piece of parchment with gold embroidery in the mail inviting her to the Stark Annual Holiday Ball, she all but crumples it up and leaves it for Liho to bat around with his paws. She only refrains from doing so for the sole reason that she knows Tony could give a rat’s ass about proper invitations on expensive parchment, so the envelope had to be Pepper’s doing. She respects the woman too much to discard the invitation just like that, so she sets it on her fridge door under an arrow magnet (a self-absorbed and satisfied gift from Clint) with every intention of never looking at it again, let alone showing up to the thing at all.
In fact, she almost forgets about the ball between missions for Fury, preventing minor world crises with the Avengers, and her own quest to chase out the ghosts of her past and the stains in her ledger. Almost. She’s unhelpfully reminded during a routine hangout session with Steve, watching Bond movies and sharing Chinese takeout on her couch, her toes tucked under his thigh, when he casually brings it up.
“You excited for Stark’s thing?”
He’s watching the television as he asks it, and she is too—wrapped up in the blessed sight that is Daniel Craig emerging from an ocean (she’s a human being with working eyes, so sue her), so she’s not entirely paying attention to what he’s saying to her. She scrunches her nose, still watching the movie. “What thing?”
“You know,” he starts, then stops as he gets engrossed in the film again. Despite seeing the movie many times, she still gets pretty interested in it, so she doesn’t get frustrated when it takes Steve nearly five minutes to elaborate. “His party. Ball. Thing.”
That catches her attention, and to hide her disdain about the subject, she teases him. “‘Party ball thing’. Smooth, Rogers.”
He rolls his eyes. “You know what I meant.” He falls silent again, and she hopes that he’s dropping the subject. He's not. “So are you?”
She debates lying, telling him she doesn’t know, but—well, lying isn’t really her thing. Not with him. Not anymore. Not since the Insight incident, and definitely not since he started becoming even more of a constant in her life than before. She’s not entirely too sure what to make of that information, having never thought of him as a constant before. Hell, Clint’s not even a constant. He’s in and out because that’s just how he operates; he’s unpredictable, and she wouldn’t have him any other way. But Steve’s just… there. So, she tells him the truth. Because he doesn’t deserve any less, no matter how small of a lie it would have been.
“Parties, balls—they aren’t really my thing.” It’s a “no” without actually saying it.
He catches that part, but the tilt of his head tells her that he’s not accepting that answer so easily. “Mine either. But I’m still going. So is Bruce and Clint, for that matter. And they’re hardly the party-going type.”
“You clearly have not seen Clint in his element, then. The guy’s a master at beer pong,” she scoffs. Steve gives her an odd look, but she knows that it’s not because he doesn’t know what beer pong is (she’d introduced him to that a while back; he’s pretty terrible, but has a winning advantage because he can’t get drunk). It’s because he knows she’s trying to deflect, weasel her way out of both the conversation and having to go to the ball. She used to be better at not letting people read her so easily, but she guesses that Steve’s perception skills have been honed after years of being sidelined as a youth. She huffs. “I’m not going. I’ll send my White Elephant gift with you.”
“It’s not that type of party. It’s a ball, a fundraiser. Didn’t you read the invite?” He thumbs over his shoulder at the piece of paper in question, still stuck to her fridge. Of course he’s already seen it. She suddenly has the feeling that him bringing up this topic hadn’t been so off-handed and casual after all. He nudges her legs with his elbow. “C’mon, Nat. You’ve been to plenty of balls before.”
“Yeah, for the mission,” she argues. “I’m not there as Natasha. I’m there because there’s some asshole threatening the world in some way or the other.”
“Depending on your point of view and how you feel about him, Tony threatens the world,” he jokes. They laugh at that, but his expression and voice softens when she doesn’t give him some one-liner in reply. “To be honest, I don’t wanna go either. The whole glitz, glamour of it all… it’s not really my thing, either. Still not used to it, even after years of being friends with a billionaire, I guess,” he chuckles almost bashfully, and the boyish smile he gets does things to her heart that she’s not sure she wants to acknowledge. “But, hell, I’m going anyway. I never did learn how to say ‘no’ when somebody asks something of me.”
“And I’m pretty sure you never will.”
“Nah, probably not,” he agrees with a smirk. “But hey, come on, it can’t be that bad. I’m going to have to wear a stiff tux, and you’ll have to look absolutely horrendous in a gown, but”—he breaks off with a chuckle as he dodges the half-hearted punch she aims at his bicep—“it’s gonna be fun. I promise.”
He’s tactfully trying to use the words she’d said to him right before he launched her off of his shield during the Chitauri invasion against her, the sneak. She gives him a knowing look, and he gives a wide grin back. She tips her head back and lets out a groan. “I don’t know, Steve. I can’t. I don’t even have anything to wear.”
“After years of being fed excuses as to why a lady won’t go out with a skinny guy like me, I now know that that’s just something women say in a last-ditch effort to get out of going somewhere they don’t want to.”
“You’re not skinny anymore, Steve.”
“And you’re deflecting.”
“What can I say? Deflecting is what I do best.”
He gives her a look. “Even if you didn’t have anything to wear, I’m pretty sure Pepper could get you a last minute dress. I’m also pretty sure she has some sort of magical power when it comes to things like that.”
She can’t exactly argue with either of those statements (Pepper really does work wonders when some sort of fashion is involved, most especially shoes), so instead she says, “What’s so important about me going to the damn ball, anyway?”
“Because I want you to,” he shrugs, and he sounds so ridiculously endearing and sincere at that moment that Natasha glances back at the TV. “You’ll make it less boring by being there.”
“Or, you know, you could just stay home yourself,” she suggests.
“Can’t. Already promised I’d go. And it’s for charity, so there’s also that.” He smiles shyly. “Tony might’ve guilt-tripped me with that last part.”
She shakes her head, pretending to be disappointed. “God, you’re too easy sometimes.”
“Yeah, and you’re not,” he says. “Come on, what’s it gonna take to convince you? Do I have to get down on my knees and beg?” Natasha quirks a brow, smirk crossing her lips. When Steve sees her half-amused, half-challenging expression, his face falls. “Really? You can’t be serious.”
“Oh, I definitely am. Step to it, Rogers.”
He sighs and, for a moment, stares silently at the TV. Then, with quite possibly the flattest expression Natasha’s ever seen in her entire life, slips on to the floor and balances on his knees before her. He even clasps his hands in front of him, but the extra effort really just contradicts with his totally unenthusiastic demeanor. She has to physically restrain from laughing, biting her lip to do just that.
“Please, Natasha, will you go to this fundraiser because I got roped into attending, I can’t back out now, and it’d be a little less unbearable if you were there and just as bored as me, too? Pretty please. With a cherry on top.”
She pretends to think for a moment, if only to make him squirm. And he does—shifting on his haunches to get comfortable as she sighs resolutely and taps her index finger on her chin. “You’re a terrible beggar but okay, fine, I’ll go. On one condition.”
“What?”
“You have to dance with me. One slow dance, that’s all I’m asking.”
He pretends to be overwhelmed. “I don’t know, Nat. That’s one really big condition you’re asking of me. Dancing with my friend? Whew.”
She rolls her eyes and thumps him on the shoulder. “Ass.” He grins. “Do we have a deal?”
“Yeah, we have a deal. One dance before the night ends.”
“Great. And you better brush up on your skills. Can’t have you doing the G.I. Jive in the middle of the ballroom, not in my presence.”
“For Pete’s sake, Nat, that’s a song, not a dance move.”
Natasha tips her head back and laughs, Steve shaking his head fondly beside her.
When Natasha arrives at the Tower, it’s quite literally lit up like a Christmas tree, glittering and glowing with light and making the night sky surrounding it seem brighter than it really is. If it were any other evening, she would have probably deemed the whole thing an eyesore. And, well, it is—she has to squint when the limo Stark had sent for her pulls up to the curb, but she makes an exception for just this one night, considering the event and all. She makes a move to open the door but Happy stops her, quickly stepping out from behind the wheel before walking around the car and opening it for her. She thanks him, despite it being sort of weird having him treat her like a client. She did work with him for a few months, after all, even if she had been undercover. Still. They're sort of friends, despite the fact that she flipped him on to his ass when they first met.
Happy walks with her to the Tower’s front entrance as some valet takes the limo away, blocking any paparazzi from trying to break the perimeter. She figures it’d be sort of (completely) stupid for one of them to try to get into the Black Widow’s personal space and business, but hey—some people are dumber than dirt, especially in New York. Fortunately, the media simply results to snapping pictures, the flash dotting her vision, but she makes it inside otherwise unbothered. Happy leaves her at the elevator, giving her a snide remark about not beating up all the guys that try to dance with her during the night, and she smirks before the doors close and she’s lifted to the floor housing the gala. She’s not entirely sure she could beat Steve up, at least not in her dress. They’re pretty evenly matched otherwise.
There’s an orchestra playing when she steps on to the floor—it’s an open room, one of the larger floors on the tower, and, in fact, looks exactly like the type of ballroom one would find in some sort of upper-class hotel. She’s sort of impressed. For someone who’s so invested in modern technology, Stark’s certainly let this floor remain pretty classic. It’s all towering, engraved columns and polished marble floors, with tall walls that makes her believe that this ballroom had probably been constructed by knocking out two or three floors to make space. There’s a stage at the far end of the room overlooking the dance floor, and there’re already plenty of people twirling around to the smooth, violinic tune, tuxedo jackets and sleek gowns gliding around in a subtle whirl of color.
“Jesus, Nat,” a voice softly breathes on her right, and she turns to find Steve standing there, eyebrows raised, eyes widened, and lips parted in something that she would label as awe if it didn't make her sound so conceited. Still, his expression makes her chest warm. “You look amazing.”
She glances down at the sheer fabric, at the velvet embroidery on the bodice and hem of the skirt. Steve hasn’t stopped watching at her with that look on his face, and, embarrassingly enough, her cheeks are now warm, too. “Yeah, well. I figured vintage would suit the evening nicely. And hey, we’re matching. You look good, too.”
And the thing is that he does. Natasha’s half-tempted to rove her eyes over his tall, sinewy form just to see him squirm, if only because she finds it endearing and even sort of flattering, but she spares him the embarrassment. He’s mostly wearing black, save for his dress shirt, which is white. But he certainly is a sight for sore eyes—his hair is neatly gelled to the side, reminding her of how he used to style it in the months after the ice, but with a less forties flare. His neck slightly reddens beneath his bowtie at her compliment.
“Thanks,” he beams, but he rubs at the back of his neck in a nervous tick. He typically does it when a pretty girl shows him attention and he doesn’t exactly know what to do with it—he never has and most likely never will get used to the fact that women actually want him now, though Natasha’s seen what he’d looked like before the serum and, honestly, can’t really fathom why no woman besides Carter paid attention to him. She smiles, though, at the realization that he’s nervous because this time around she’s the pretty girl making him flustered, even if they’ve been friends for a while now and he really has no reason for being shy around her anymore. “Uh, do you want a drink? I can get you something?”
Her smile softens, and despite the fact that she doesn’t want to start drinking so early to avoid being past tipsy by the end of the night, she nods. She figures that saying no would just make Steve even more unreasonably bashful than he already he is. The distraction of going to the bar would probably help him clear his head, anyway.
“Right, then,” he says. His signature boyish grin pushes through his nervousness then, and there’s the Steve that she’s used to. “I’ll be right back.”
“Don’t take so long or I’ll be forced to find a different dance partner,” she calls after him, and she’s glad to see that, even though he flushes a bit, he also laughs.
As soon as Steve’s out of ear shot, she takes a few steps closer to the dancefloor to get a better look at the room. She immediately spots Tony and Pepper on the other side, chatting with a few people she doesn’t recognize but has a feeling are probably rich as hell and, therefore, being schmoozed by her friends so that they’ll donate money to the charity. Next, she finds Thor and Jane spinning about on the dancefloor, the latter laughing as Thor grins and whispers something in her ear, and then Darcy skirts past them with her own dance partner, quickly leaning in to mutter something witty, if the smirk on her face is anything to go by. Bruce is hovering by an elegantly decorated table housing hors d’oeuvres, and Natasha watches with amusement as he shoves something into his mouth only to struggle to chew and swallow it down quickly as another man walks up to him to talk. She moves on to observe the rest of the room, and after a few quick sweeps, she can’t find Clint anywhere. As much as he can be the life of a house party, formal balls aren’t exactly his scene, so she doesn’t really expect to see him. However, he did say something about making an appearance when she mentioned to him that Steve had convinced her to go a few days ago…
“If you make Rogers blush any harder people are gonna start to get seriously concerned.”
She rolls her eyes but can’t help the smirk that crosses her face as she turns to face her best friend. This is the most she’s ever seen him dressed up—he’s wearing a gray tuxedo that actually looks quite nice on him, with actual dress shoes to boot. His face is relatively unshaven, clean of any cuts or bruises, and she can’t smell any foul odors from where she’s standing, just something that she has a faint feeling might be Axe body spray, but hey, at least he put in some effort. In fact, his lack of unkemptness would make her question where her best friend was really at were it not for his hair, which is just as spiky and disheveled as ever. In the years since her defection, she’s never known him to own a comb.
He grins at her expression. “All jokes aside, you do look nice, Tasha.”
“You too.” She looks him over. “Didn’t even know you owned a tux.”
He huffs a laugh. “I don’t. This is a rental. You seriously expect me to pay that much for something I’ll never wear again? It’s itchy. And besides, had I had say in what I was gonna wear tonight, I would’ve showed up in slacks, at the very most.”
“Then who’s responsible for this very un-Clint look?”
“Bobbi,” he sighs. “She saw the invite on my kitchen table. The next morning I woke up to find my suit measurements taped up on my refrigerator door. And even then she had to threaten to beat me with her batons to get me in the damn thing.”
“You’ve got to be joking. Clint, you didn’t know your own measurements?”
“I know measurements. Small, medium, and large. I don’t see what the purpose of all these numbers are for.”
She shakes her head in exasperation. “Did you come stag? Or is Bobbi here now?”
“Nah, she’s got her own thing going on with Hunter again,” he explains with a shake of his head. “To be honest, I think her track record might be worse than mine, considering she seems to marry the guys she works with.”
“Two guys. And she has a type.” He raises an eyebrow in questioning. “Smartass.”
“Very funny,” he replies, then gestures at something over her shoulder with a nod of his head. She doesn’t have to look to know that he's indicating where Steve’s still standing at the bar, his back to the both of them. “Cap’s got a type, too.”
She’s not entirely sure she wants to know the answer, despite the fact that she has a strong feeling where he’s taking this conversation. Still, she asks, “What?”
“Not American.”
She rolls her eyes. “Clint—”
“There’s Carter,” he starts, interrupting her. “And then there’s you.”
She’s silent for a moment, unsure of what to say to that. Sure, she’s known for a while now that despite the fact that her and Steve are friends, maybe even something akin to best friends, they have unspoken tension between them. And even if it’s not something she wants to acknowledge, she knows that that tension far surpasses the sexual kind. She sees the way that Steve looks at her sometimes, the way he smiles whenever she leans against him or rests her legs in his lap. Hell, he even got it the other night, when she tucked her feet underneath his thigh. She’s not exactly unaffected herself, either. Sometimes she has to hide the way she shivers when he absentmindedly plays with her hair as they watch a movie, or she has to ignore the warmth that uncurls in her chest whenever he spontaneously shows up at her door with a bag of her favorite takeout items in his hand. Damn it, the way he was looking at her earlier with such reverence in his eyes nearly had her stomach doing backflips, cheeks practically reddened in a blush. Anxiousness of that kind is just not something Natasha experiences, and blushing isn’t just something she does. In fact, it’s only ever because of Steve, in some way or the other.
She wants nothing more than to punch Clint Barton in the face.
Fortunately, he’s not regarding her with a know-it-all expression, otherwise she probably would have smacked him. Instead he’s simply looking at her with something that distinctly resembles pity, only she knows that he’s not stupid enough to give her that. Still, it makes her mad. Her hands involuntarily curl into firsts at her sides.
Clint notices it, of course. “I’m not going to pretend I don’t know the reason why you two don’t work your shit out, Tash, I’m not. But you deserve happiness.”
“Who says I’m not happy?” She snaps in a low voice.
“Fine. You’re happy. But you deserve satisfaction,” he corrects. “You telling me you’re perfectly content doing this weird not-dating thing with Rogers for the rest of your life? Never to wonder what could come out of a real relationship?”
“You’ve never been in a real relationship in your life, Barton.”
He doesn’t even seem hurt by her comment. He knows that she’s just getting defensive. She hates it. “I’ve been in exactly one real relationship: Bobbi. I’ll always love her; you know that, she knows that. And I’m not left wondering what could have been, because it happened.”
She glances away, jaw clenched and eyes narrowed at some unspecific spot on the ground. Somehow her gaze wanders from that spot to Steve, who’s still standing at the bar waiting for their drinks. It’s almost like he feels her looking at him, because he suddenly turns his head and looks at her, giving her a smile. She returns it, then turns back to Clint. She knows he’s right. She does. She’s just… stubborn? Unsure? Afraid of what will happen if she does step out of this comfort zone she currently has with Steve, only for everything to come crashing down on top of her?
Clint steps forward and gently grips her bicep, smiling. Despite the fact that she wants to pull away, she can’t. And she can’t maintain her scowl, either. “He cares about you. A lot. I do, too, Tasha. But we both know that it’s different.”
Natasha doesn’t say anything for a long moment. It’s definitely different. She loves Clint, she does, and even though they might’ve made a brief attempt at some semblance of a romance years ago, he’s like her brother now. Her family. All of the Avengers are, really. But yeah, there’s always been something about Steve that separated him from how she viewed her other teammates. Something more. In many ways, she and him have been through a lot together, more than she has with the others. Clint saved her, back then. He knows that he doesn’t need to do it now. But Steve? Despite all her protests, even if he knows it, too—he’ll still try to save her, anyway. He’ll try because he wants to, not because he has to.
And that’s when Natasha doesn’t really want to hit Clint so much as herself, because yes. She wants to try with Steve, too.
“You’re an idiot,” she finally mutters, but she makes sure to smile so he knows she isn’t angry anymore.
He grins. “You saying that to me or yourself?”
She rolls her eyes. “You’re an idiot,” she says again.
“Ah. Me then,” he laughs. His smile softens. “I love you, too.”
She punches his arm away from her, the same sentiment in itself, and he chuckles. He briefly glances over her shoulder, and Natasha turns her head to the side and sees Steve approaching in her peripheral.
Clint sighs in finality. “Alright, I’m gonna go raid the appetizer table. I saw some stuffed mushroom things earlier and I’m famished.”
“Try not to stain your tux. It is a rental, after all.”
“No promises,” he calls back, backing away with a grin.
Natasha turns once Steve’s a few steps behind her, two clear drinks in his hand and a slightly confused expression on his face as he watches Clint weave through the crowd. “Barton looks very… not-Barton.”
“Tell me about it,” she says, but she smiles fondly at her best friend’s retreating back.
Steve hands her one of the drinks. “Vodka tonic. Sorry it took so long. They’re pretty swamped back there.”
“No worries. Clint and I had a very… beneficial chat.”
He raises an eyebrow. “About?”
She shrugs, smirking. “Well, that’s for me to know and you to find out, isn’t it, Rogers?”
“What, do I have to dance it out of you?” He laughs.
“Maybe.” She draws out the syllable.
“Because I do have some tricks up my sleeve, you know,” he continues. “I just might surprise you.”
“Oh? So you’ve been practicing?”
“You don’t need—” He starts to say, but then he stops himself, tilting his head to the side and shrugging with a bashful grin. “Okay, I might’ve taken some classes a few months back.”
She raises her eyebrows in surprise. “Wow, and no invite?”
“I was hardly about to take a classically trained ballerina with me to an Intro to Dance class,” he says. “First of all, you’d dance circles around me and everyone else in there, including the instructor. Two, you’d never stop teasing me about it. You’re relentless.”
“Who’s to say I won’t tease you about it now?”
“Oh, you will. But you might stop as soon as our dance comes.”
Natasha smirks at that, interest even more piqued. She takes a sip of her drink. “We’ll see about that. But for now, did you learn how to lindy hop?”
Steve laughs, shaking his head at her teasing. They talk for a few more minutes until Sam joins them and he and Steve start discussing their search for Barnes, and Natasha decides that it’s probably time she go greet the others. Besides, as much as she supports Steve in his search for his best friend, that whole ordeal is currently his and Sam’s quest, and she doesn’t have anything legitimately helpful to add to that, unfortunately. Steve sees her off with a warm smile and a nod, and she leisurely walks along the outskirts of the ballroom until she finds herself stopping at the table Tony and Pepper have since relocated to, the latter subtly stuffing her face with appetizers and the former much more conspicuously.
“Nat, you made it,” Pepper brightens once she spots her, smiling. “Tony says you came as Steve’s date.” Natasha fixes Tony with a glare, if only out of habit. It’s not like she’s against the idea of being Steve’s date (far from it), but it’s not exactly the truth, either. Pepper laughs. “Yeah, I told him I’d believe it when I saw it.”
“For the record, I saw it,” Tony pipes in, lifting a finger. He nods to where she had been standing earlier near the bar. “Over there, to be precise, flirting up a storm. As per usual.”
Pepper smacks her boyfriend on the arm, causing him to drop whatever he's currently eating and smearing sauce on one of the lapels of his tux jacket. “Great, Pep. Just great. Look what you did.”
“Well, maybe you should stop being so clumsy, then,” she suggests innocently before turning her head towards Natasha and rolling her eyes in exasperation. Natasha laughs, promises her that she’ll talk to her later, and continues the rounds. Thor and Jane have since retired from dancing, and when Natasha approaches them, she notices that Jane has discarded her heels and has her feet resting in Thor’s lap. Darcy’s plowing through what’s supposed to be a dish of caviar for the guests to share, but it appears that she’s made it her own personal plate. She smiles tight-lipped at Natasha once she sits down, and the four of them have a brief discussion about the merits of a tuxedo on a well-built man, if only because Thor has pretty liberal opinions about nearly everything and openly states that Steve fits a tux “rather nicely.” Darcy lifts her flute of champagne and suggests a mini-toast to that, and Natasha excuses herself to find Bruce before she not only starts matching drinks with Darcy, but also gets too caught up in the blessed sight that is Steve Rogers in a tuxedo.
Natasha does find Bruce, nestled in one of the less active and noisy corners of the ballroom, but she stops once she gets to a vantage point that allows her to see that he’s very much not alone. He has his head bent toward a brunette woman’s, whispering something in her ear. It apparently makes her laugh because she tips her head back and does just that, and Natasha recognizes her as Betty Ross. She’s never formally met her, but she’s seen her in the SHIELD reports from Banner’s incident in ‘08. Thus, Natasha knows how much Betty means to Bruce—and that he hardly ever spends time with her—so she leaves them alone, planning to head back in the direction she came.
Only when she turns, Steve’s standing there, hands in his pockets and small smile on his face. “The band just announced the last song before Tony and Pepper go up on stage and kick off the benefit,” he says, then offers one of his hands out to her. “So, care to share a dance, Miss Romanoff?”
She rolls her eyes at his cheesiness, but she’s smiling as she says, “Here’s your chance to impress me, Rogers,” and takes his hand.
He leads her out to the middle of the dance floor, palm warm and firm against hers. The band starts the last song. She thinks she recognizes it from somewhere, but can’t really put her finger on it—maybe she heard it back when she was with the Bolshoi, maybe she heard it at a concert somewhere. Either way, it’s the perfect tune to dance to. It’s not too fast, not the type to require a waltz or a tango. She figures Steve’s not that advanced yet, despite his cockiness. It’s not too slow, either, so it doesn’t present an air of intimacy that means this should only be danced to by couples. It’s, for lack of a better word, perfect. And the notes and chords resonate in her bones as Steve places one hand on the small of her back, holding her other at shoulder length, and starts swaying.
The closeness that the dance puts their bodies at nearly steals Natasha’s breath away, because her senses are suddenly filled with him. She can see the stubble starting to grow back in on his jaw. She can smell his cologne, spicy yet crisp. If she listens hard enough she can hear his heart beating steadily against his ribcage. And when she presses even closer to him, she can feel the vibrations against her sternum as he hums quietly to the tune of the song.
The vibration grows stronger as he says, “So. You were going to tell me about your very beneficial chat with Clint.”
He’s so tall that she has to crane her head up to look at him because of the proximity. “Thought you were going to dance it out of me first?”
“Have I not yet?” She laughs. He sighs when she doesn’t relent. “Well, we’ve got to talk about something. Isn’t the weather nice today?”
“Small talk doesn’t work for you,” she replies with a wrinkled nose.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Absentmindedly, his hand slides further up her back. The friction has her fighting off a shiver, and she rests the side of her head against Steve’s chest to keep him from seeing how her cheeks have turned pink. The rumble as he speaks is even louder and more pleasant as he continues, “We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. Didn’t know it was about something serious.”
“It’s not,” she instantly answers, but then shakes her head without removing it from his sternum. “Well, it is. I don’t…”
“You don’t have to tell me anything, Natasha.”
But I do. “We talked about… happiness. Or—satisfaction.” She lets out a deep breath. Steve holds her hand tighter, and the gesture sort of grounds her.
“Satisfaction?”
“With relationships. My current standing relationships.”
“Okay,” he says, but she can hear traces of confusion in his voice. “Why?”
She takes another breath. “Because…” She starts, but the words get caught up in her throat. She’s faced assassins, alien invasions, and neo-Nazi organizations. Thieves and thugs. Hunters and killers. She’s never blinked in the face of any of them. But right here, right now? She’s fucking terrified, she feels sick with anxiety, and all she wants to do is flee.
So she moves to do just that, making to step away. “Steve, I—I gotta go.”
“What? Wait, no,” Steve catches her wrist, keeping his grip gentle but firm. “Nat, hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to talk about it, let’s just—let’s keep dancing.”
She shakes her head, but doesn’t pull her arm out of his grasp. “You don’t understand. I do have to talk about it. Otherwise you and I’ll just be trapped in whatever… whatever this is, and—”
He frowns. “‘You and I?’”
She pauses, horrified at her slip-up. She’s completely tempted to just shut up and actually run away, but then a voice sounds in the back of her head, distinctly sounding like Clint—don’t back out. It’s now or never.
Letting out a long sigh, Natasha closes her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose with her other hand before nodding slowly. “Yes, you and I. Steve, what the hell is even going on between us?”
His eyebrows knit together. “What are you talking about? I thought… I thought you liked whatever this is. I thought that you wanted this.”
“You thought—?” She laughs ironically. “Hell, Rogers, I don’t even know what I want.”
“I don’t think this is a conversation we should be having here,” he says firmly, and she doesn’t resist as he tugs her away from the dancefloor and through a set of large doors across the ballroom, emerging onto a large balcony. There’s a couple already nestled in the corner against the railing, giggling and lightly petting each other over their clothes, and Steve gives them an uncharacteristic glare before they catch the hint and go back inside. For a moment Natasha watches the city below them, still frightened and nervous as ever. She can feel Steve watching her profile for a while before he finally breaks the silence.
“I thought you were happy,” he starts quietly. “With what we have right now. I thought you were satisfied with it.”
There’s that word again. She’d never noticed before tonight how happiness and satisfaction are not the same thing. “I thought I was too,” she replies without looking at him. “My idiot of a best friend shattered that misconception.” She huffs another ironic laugh. “Thing is, though… I’m not even sure if it really was a misconception or just me being…” She quiets, her voice trailing off.
Steve’s voice is hardly louder than a whisper as he supplies, “Uncertain? Scared?” She can’t bring herself to look at him. To admit to him that she’s terrified when she can barely even admit it to herself. He steps closer, but she doesn’t inch away. “Natasha, you’re not the only one, you know.”
She shakes her head. “Steve, I want to try this, I do,” she says, eyes trained but not focused on the skyline. “But this isn’t… I’m not that kind of person.”
“What kind of person?” He frowns, but he sounds sort of angry, like he knows the answer.
“The type of person that you deserve. Need. I’m not that.” She grits her jaw. “The shit I’ve done—”
“Nat, who are you to decide what kind of person I deserve? How do you know who I need?” His voice is soft, but he shakes his head. “I don’t even care what type of person you think I deserve, and I don’t want you to be that person, either. I just want you to be you. Your past doesn’t matter to me. I mean, it does matter, in the sense that I care that it still haunts you, but it’s not going to stop how I feel about you. And I don’t dwell on the past. If I did—well, it’d make my life a lot more painful. Natasha, look at me.”
She does. His eyes are soft, lips pressed in a gentle line in a semblance of a smile, but it’s almost too sad to be just that. She understands the sentiment, though, so she doesn’t pull away when he hooks a finger around one of her own. “Your past isn’t what defines you. Not when, right now, you’re still dedicated to atoning for it. That’s the type of person I admire, Natasha. That’s the person I want.”
“And the person you need?”
His smile widens now, almost transitioning into a full-on grin. “I thought the implication was pretty clear.”
She smiles too, but quickly sobers as she says, “What if this doesn’t work out? What if things change, and we can’t go back to how we were before?”
He laughs quietly. “Now I just think you’re fishing for excuses.”
She frowns and aims a punch at his shoulder, though she’s not completely mad. “Fuck you, Rogers, I’m terrified.”
“I know,” he murmurs, suddenly sober again. “And I know how much it took out of you to admit that.”
“Yeah, well. You have a habit of making me act out of character,” she grumbles. “I hate it.”
He steps even closer, now. “I don’t think you do.”
She opens her mouth to reply, but Steve tucks a finger beneath her chin, slightly tilting her head up so that he can look her in the eyes. She inhales a sharp breath, unable to move from the moment. She’s not even sure that she wants to. Steve watches her, eyes searching her own before falling down to her lips. She doesn’t dare move, doesn’t dare to even swallow, let alone breathe, and she feels like she’s simultaneously floating but also rooted to the spot.
“I’m going to kiss you now?” She knows that he probably means it as a statement, but it turns up at the end in an endearing and more than frustrating bout of sudden anxiousness. She finds it sweet and more than a little exasperating that he can go from confident one second to shy the next, but she can’t find it in her to berate him for it right now. Not when all she can do is nod, and then his lips are descending onto hers.
He tastes like alcohol he can’t get drunk off of and something faintly spicy from the appetizer table, but most of all he tastes like him, and Natasha can’t even begin to explain what that even means, just knows that she likes it and that she’s instantly craving more. Her knees weaken once Steve tilts her chin up even higher to deepen the angle, his tongue tentatively flicking at the seam of her mouth. She parts it willingly, gasping when he grazes his tongue against her palette, her hands tightening around the lapels of his jacket. Steve groans once she does the same. They kiss until they’re breathless, and when they part, Natasha rests her forehead against his chest, eyes closed.
After a moment of silently trying to catch their breaths, Natasha asks, “Did you learn that in a class, too?”
The rumble in his chest as he laughs vibrates against her hands, which she has flattened over his chest. “Nah. Learned that back when it was still the twentieth century.”
“Christ, don’t remind me. I’m getting ready to date a senior citizen.”
“Technically, we’re the same age,” he grins. She laughs quietly, but stops and regards him with a questioning expression once he steps back and closes his hand around her own. “Come on, let’s finish our dance.”
She briefly glances inside. She can hear Pepper speaking through a microphone, with Tony throwing in comments here and there that result in a fit of laughter from the guests. “They’re not even playing music anymore.”
“I’ve got a good memory,” he says as he taps a finger against the side of his head. “I can sing the melody they were playing, if you want.”
She rolls her eyes at him, but it’s a thought that she’s not entirely against. She lets Steve take her into his arms again, leaning her head against his shoulder and relaxing into his body, his warmth as they start swaying. When he actually does start humming the tune, she doesn’t stop him. The sound is almost enough to lure her asleep, but her eyes flutter open once Steve presses a kiss to her forehead. When she looks up at him, his eyes are already trained on her, twinkling with emotion.
This time, when she thinks that Steve looks at her with nothing but awe and reverence in his eyes, she doesn’t feel so self-centered. She’s still scared, sure. The uncertainty will always be there, the paranoia that things could come tumbling down at any moment. But mostly she feels… right. Satisfied. And it’s enough to quash all of her doubts so that she can just enjoy the moment, enjoy the feel of being in Steve's embrace.