Only one true love

Part 3: Chapter 2

Steve let me stay at his apartment with him until the Avengers' headquarters were over. So, when we got there late at night that day, we didn't go to sleep. We couldn't. We chatted instead.

"How are you alive?" was the first question I asked him.

"When I crashed with a plane, I froze. I guess that was because of the super-soldier serum," he said.

"How did you get out?"

"Some people from SHIELD found me and brought me to Nick Fury. When I woke up, he explained to me that I was asleep for seventy years."

"You didn't die because of the super-soldier serum? That's awesome!" I said happily.

"Yeah, I know," he said.

"So, I guess it must've been a shock when you woke up in 'modern world'," I said.

"Huge shock. So many things changed since the 1940s'" he said, "Phones?! I didn't figure out how to use them yet." We laughed.

"For your information, I don't know how to use them either," I said, "What else has changed a lot?"

"Music! Oh my God! What happened to Bing Crosby or Frank Sinatra?! The music was perfectly good in the 1940s," he complained.

"I know right?"

"What else?" he thought, "What are your thoughts of clothes?"

"Oh my God! No! I don't like it. Nat gave me this. What the hell?" I said, taking off the hoodie Nat gave me to show him the crop top and jeans I had, "Why do women wear this? Just why? Why can't it be a normal T-shirt and normal jeans!" I complained.

"And look at these shoes!" I said, showing him high heels, "How do they even walk in these?! I don't understand! What's wrong with normal shoes?!"

"Jeez, calm down Rose," Steve tried to calm me down. He couldn't because he was laughing.

"Stop laughing! You try to walk in these! My feet are killing me! Try to clean the tower in them! And I couldn't take them off because there were pieces of glass on the floor!" I said. He stopped laughing.

"Come on, deep breaths. Let's think about things we think are good," he said, thinking.

"I love this hoodie," I said while putting it on, "It's practical. It's practical. It's comfortable, it has a hood, it has pockets. It's great."

"Yeah, I like hoodies as well," he agreed.

"I like sweatpants too. They are good for running." He went to his closet to show me sweatpants.

"They are nice," I said, "I would like to have one."

"You can ask Nat to go shopping. She would be delighted," he said, smiling.

"When I told her I had nothing to wear, she freaked out. She basically pulled me all the way to the shopping centre. We went into every shop," he said, laughing. I joined.

"Better get it over then."

"Yeah," he said.

"What did you do when you found out we, um.... you know when we...," he asked after a few minutes.

"Died?" I asked, quietly.

"You don't have to answer," he said when he saw my face. I remembered the pain and sadness.

"It's okay. My mother came because Heimdall told her I was in bad shape and she took me to Asgard," I answered. 

"So, you haven't been on Earth since the 1940s?"

"No," I said and then remembered, "Except that one time, a year ago, when I went to get Thor and we fought the Destroyer."

"Fought the Destroyer?" he asked, confused. I told him what happened.

"He did that to his own brother?!" he asked in disbelief when I finished, "I mean they are not technically brothers, but what?"

"He's not that bad when you get to know him. He's just jealous of Thor. Their father, Odin, spent most of the time with Thor because he was older and the next heir to the throne. That's why he wanted to be the king. So, when the time came, Loki wanted to make sure that Thor would never come back. Then they got into a fight because of that. Family drama," I concluded.

"I don't know how that makes him better," Steve said. We were in silence for a few minutes.

"Can I ask you something?" I asked Steve.

"Of course." 

"Well, you are supposed to be dead, but you are alive, aren't you? What about...? What happened to...? Do you think he might be still alive?" I wasn't looking at him.

"No, I'm sorry. He fell off a moving train in the mountains. I tried to save him, I really did," Steve said like he was justifying himself. I heard pain and sadness in his voice. I couldn't imagine how it must have been for him, watching his best friend fall and wanting to help him, but couldn't. I wanted to say something else but didn't know what. Instead, I got up.

"I'm going to sleep," I said, "If we don't show up at Stark's tower early tomorrow, he might not want to do our bedrooms."
"Yeah, you are right," he smiled, trying to hide the pain from me, "Night."

"Night," I said and went to the room he gave me to sleep.