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5
When Steve was expelled from his middle school for wearing the boy’s uniform, Sarah Rogers made the logical choice for her son and lied to the next one.
Steve smiled brightly at his Ma, the blonde meticulously helping him arrange his new uniform. Running a hand through his short hair, Sarah spoke.
“Now, doesn’t that feel better, huh?” Steve nodded, grin fixed and bright on his face. “Now, remember what to say if they ask you questions.”
“I was expelled ‘cause I didn’t wear my uniform” Steve recites, and Sarah gives a firm nod, wrapping him up in a tight hug before sending him off.
Steve arrived just before the start of class, running a hand over his uniform (the BOYS uniform!). The teacher gave him a nod before prompting him to introduce himself and take a seat.
“Hi, my name’s Steve Rogers”
There was exactly one time, as a teen, where someone mistook him for a girl, and the encounter still stuck with Steve.
Two women, strong and sturdy looking, had approached him outside his stoop, asking about his old name. Steve barely kept himself from tensing when the name was said, but he kept a calm face as he spoke.
“No, there’s no Rogers by that name here. You’ve got the wrong place, Ma’ams”
The women shared a look before seemingly deciding to drop it, and within a blink, they were gone. Steve glanced around, recounting it to his Ma at supper, who nodded, making a note to herself to figure out where those gals had gotten her son’s old files.
Dr. Erskine finding his other enlistment forms was probably a good thing, when considered. If they found out he’d forged only this one, they may have figured out much more. But that wasn’t the case, and Steve was going to become a “Super Soldier” now!
Sure, hiding the fact he was in a girl body was harder now, but he’s been doing this for years, he’ll be fine.
The big thing he was worried about was the serum. What would it do to him? They were expecting this to be going into a male, not whatever Steve was. Would that mess something up? Would they find out?
Turns out, besides it hurting like a bitch, Steve had nothing to worry about. When he first caught sight of his reflection afterwards, he almost cried. He looked like a man. Fully, truly male. He really wanted to talk to Bucky, share his excitement, but alas, Buck wasn’t here.
The howling commandos were even harder to hide from. Sure, he had Bucky’s help now, but that only went so far when he still had woman parts. He had to be careful when changing or taking a piss, because no matter how much Steve trusted the howlies with his life, he still couldn’t help but hide this part.
“Hey Steve! There’s some hot springs over here! How about we all take a break?” Dougan spoke with a bright tone, and Steve felt himself mentally clam up for a millisecond.
“You all can go ahead, I run too warm now.” Steve says, giving his own lopsided grin back to his group, Bucky sending him a sympathetic look, one that promised he’d bring Steve back here to enjoy it once the sun went down. Steve’s smile grew softer.
The other Avengers seemed nice enough, but when Tony offered him a room at the tower, he found himself declining. Living with people always made it harder for secrets, especially when two of the residents were spies and another was an actual genius.
So, Steve just accepted Tony’s second offer of an apartment, picking out a Brooklyn 2 bed a few blocks away from his old place with Bucky. It was nice, not living in shield facilities, but he did have to admit that it was quite a lot lonelier.
Turning up at the tower became a regular occurrence, even without him living there. But he still avoided all invitations to stay over, go swimming, or attend anything too late into the night. The world had changed a lot since the 40s, but old habits die hard.
+1
It ended up being some random news story that finally broke his silence.
The reporter was droning on about some legislation relating to school sports, and Tony was groaning at it, only watching to nitpick and tear down everything the man was saying, but admittedly, Steve wasn’t paying much attention, seeing as he was playing cards with Clint. But something caught his attention. It was a specific set of words he’d heard himself think before, and others speak.
“But these boys and girls pretending to be the opposite are ruining the sports!”
Tony, as he’d been doing, was continuing to rant and complain about every sentence, but Steve’s head had turned to stare at the screen, now very interested in what was happening.
It seemed to catch the others’ attentions as well, seeing as Tony paused the news, the others looking at him with all sorts of expressions ranging from apprehension to hope.
Steve felt the awkward tension filling the room, so he cleared his throat, speaking up first.
“They were talking about transvestites, right? What law was he talking about?”
It seemingly came as a surprise to most of them that he knew anything about the topic, though Bruce was quick to correct him on the modern terminology.
“We use the word transgender now, but yes.”
Steve gave a polite, grateful smile and tilted his head, “What was he talking about, though?”
There was another pause before Tony went to speak.
“The supreme court just passed a law that made it so transgender kids could use the facilities and join clubs that correspond to their gender, instead of their biological sex.”
Steve nodded. “That’s nice. Wasn’t allowed back in my day, glad it is now.”
Clint sent him an incredulous look, very plainly asking “Aren’t you from like, the 40s? How are you so progressive?”
The larger blond pauses, eyes moving between the screen and each of his teammates. Should he? It was clear now that they all held positive opinions, and it was something he could so easily slip into the conversation. So, he did.
“I was born a girl. I like both, too.” He gave a stiff shrug, letting himself give a small, breathy laugh at Tony and Clint’s whiplash, all five drifting off into comfortable conversation. Yeah, Steve could live with this.