It's a promise

Chapter 43

Rylee's POV

Wanda, Sam and Bucky told me they would be on missions for an unknown period of time and that they would try to come around. Since everybody came back a lot of countries had problems so the Avengers were back even though it was none of the OGs as Sam called them. At the moment they just had Scarlet Witch, Falcon, the Winter Soldier who was now known as the White Wolf and War Machine. Peter Parker was still in school but he helped in New York as Spiderman as much as possible.

Clint retired for good this time and just spent time with his family. Tony and Bruce couldn't fight anymore and didn't want to fight and Thor left to help the galaxy. There was a reason I knew everything about them. I had a Stark Phone which meant I stayed in contact with Friday. Just because I wanted to be informed how everybody was doing and how Tony was recovering.

Bucky came a week after I gave birth to get to know the baby. He spent a lot of time with Morgan but a baby was totally new to him. I laughed when he held Charlie with his right arm because Charlie grabbed a finger of his left hand and didn't want to let go. I saw the slight fear in his eyes when Charlie cried after he softly pulled the metal finger out of Charlie's tiny hand. Charlie stopped crying after he had the finger back in his grip.

I wasn't mad that I didn't see anybody else yet and him just once because he was just passing by for his next mission. I was stressed enough with Charlie who didn't sleep one night through. I didn't expect to be a single mum but I made it work. Even though he was a little early, he was healthy and for me the cutest baby ever.

He was exactly six weeks old now and I wanted to wait a couple more weeks until I would drive to Missouri. It was time that my family would meet my son. The only person who knew I was pregnant was Laura and I knew she kept this a secret until I was ready. I was a little bit excited for Clint's face when he would realize he was kinda a grandfather now.

A sad smile appeared on my face. I missed them. I missed them all. I looked over to Charlie who fell asleep. His hair was nearly as dark as mine but he had Steve's blue eyes. I hoped he would have mine because he reminded me of Steve every day. It still hurt and I stood there with all the anger, sadness and longing deep inside me. I was flooded with all these emotions, which came back to me ruthless and merciless.

I shook my head because I didn't want to feel like this when I looked at my son. I loved him more than anything already and I didn't want my feelings towards his father affected this. I still loved Steve. I didn't think I could ever stop. But this love was also accompanied with anger, hate and sadness so I needed to get over him.

I couldn't stay in the past with my heart. I lived in a beautiful little town, I had a new job and a new name. I should use it to start a new life and not just hide from my past. It was time to look into the future. Steve was my past, not my future. I thought I was finally ready to move on.

I never talked with Steve about possible baby names because we never really had a reason to talk about that. But even when we would have talked about that I wouldn't have used these names. Not because I wanted to be hateful but when he went back to Peggy I didn't know if they had kids. I wouldn't want them to be named the same as my son. I used Steve's second name Grant though. Charlie was still Steve's son after all and although I wasn't enough for him, I knew our son would have been. And Charlie should know someday how much his father would have loved him.

When I was in the hospital I chose to name him after the two men who raised me and after his father. Charles Clinton Grant Smith. Everybody knew my father under the name Barney because of his second name Bernard but his birth name was Charles. When I found out I was pregnant, I knew I would call a son Charles and a girl Natasha Charlotte. Nat would have adored my little Pumpkin. I missed her.