𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗥𝗬𝗢𝗡𝗘 𝗖𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗧𝗘𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗬 𝗗𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗.
Charlie Stark-Rogers has grown up in the shadow of the world's greatest heroes. But spending your entire life in the face of danger takes its toll on anyone. She has secrets, thi...
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𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐄𝐖𝐀𝐒𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐋𝐄, she was scared of the dark.
It took years for Steve and Tony to convince her that she could sleep alone in her own room at night. The second the lights went out she would start to cry, begging and begging for her dads, until they would finally relent and let her sleep in their bed with them.
She would snuggle up between the two, Tony's hand gently running through her hair and Steve's hand rubbing her back, until she fell asleep, the nightstand lamp illuminating her face in its soft yellow glow, and the two exhausted men would look at each other in desperate exasperation, trying to understand the problem.
They even talked to a phycologist and other parents about it. Everyone said it was just a phase, that she would grow out of it, and to slowly wean her out of the habit of climbing into bed with her parents every night.
But while everyone else's toddlers seemed to mature, forgetting about the imaginary monsters under their beds and in their closets, feeling secure enough to get through the night on their own, Charlie seemed to only get worse.
She had lights all over her bedroom- lamps and string lights and a flashlight on her nightstand- and she always kept them lit, even at night. She tore down the curtains hanging over the windows when Tony first put them up, because she didn't want to block the sun.
Something about the darkness, or rather, the absence of light, just scared Charlie out of her mind.
One particularly rough night, Steve was out on a mission, and Tony was left trying to wrangle a terrified four year old Charlie to go to bed. He was doing exactly what the psychologist had said- to just force her to sleep in her own room, no matter how much she cried. After a few weeks, supposedly, she would have no problems with it anymore.
But every time he would lay her down, go back to his own room, and finally start to doze off, the tiny shadow of his daughter would appear in his doorway, sobbing and shaking.
For what seemed like the millionth time, he sat her on his lap and waited until she met his eyes. Her chubby brown cheeks were rosy and wet from tears, her little lips trembling. He took her tiny hands in his and asked her why. Why she was so scared. What it was about the dark that terrified her so much?
She buried her face in his chest, her tiny hands gripping his plain white T-shirt, her tears staining his shirt. He held her tightly, pressing a kiss to her sweaty forehead, listening as she sobbed her answer.
"Please don't leave me."
And then it clicked.
Charlie wasn't scared of the dark.
She was scared of being alone.
Because in Charlie's mind, when the light disappeared, so did her dads. Out of sight, out of mind. It was a hard concept for a little girl to understand.
