𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐋 𝐃𝐀𝐌𝐀𝐆𝐄 | 𝘞𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘢𝘕𝘢𝘵

- CHAPTER 3

| CHAPTER 3 |
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CATCH TO RELEASE
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- The Lumineers

| 24TH MAY 2015 |

          NATASHA FOUND HERSELF WATCHING THE SOKOVIAN CAREFULLY. At every chance that presented itself, she would glance in Wanda's direction, making sure that she'd eaten or that any of the self-inflicted wounds had been tended to. Never in her life before had Natasha felt such the urge as she did now to care for another person, to love and nourish them. It hadn't been her kind of style of life.

She supposed it was her upbringing that prevented the growth of her care. Dreykov had been sure to whip it out of at every given chance. Natasha had learnt that the fragility and uncertainty of loving someone else, even just caring for them, would bring an end to a life. And yet, even after she'd been freed from his grasp, she couldn't find it in herself to move on from his words.

For Yelena had been stripped from her. Her mother, father, even the ones that she pretended with for those three years back in Ohio, she cared about them, and yet she hadn't seen nor heard from them in twenty years. She should have gone back for Yelena. Her 'kind-of' sister. The one person that she had a sort of unconditional love for.

But the past was the past, and the future didn't wait for dwellers.

Natasha wasn't even sure what she felt for the Sokovian. Wanda sat on the sofa opposite her, the noise of her sitcom blaring out of Stark's newly made speakers, the picture clear as day. But Nat wasn't heeding the fake stunts and cringe-worthy accidents any attention. She was gazing at the new mark on Wanda's head, which had tried to hide behind the locks of auburn brown hair that fell from her ear. Natasha didn't feel like prying, but she guessed that her staring seemed to do the job for her.

"I fell." The Sokovian's accent was thick and sturdy. No matter how hard Wanda tried to lose a little bit of it, the more it seemed to want to stick. But Wanda didn't mind: it made her feel still attached to her brother, like unless she lost her voice, she wouldn't lose him. At least not his memory.

Natasha nodded her head and kicked herself inwardly. No one told her to care so much for someone, and she didn't know why she did care so much. She supposed her lack of love during her upbringing both blinded her and opened her eyes. Wanda was a vulnerable girl, whose life had been fucked ever since she had fallen into the hands of HYDRA, like Natasha's had when Dreykov got to her. At least Wanda's parents hadn't given her up so willingly.

Wanda no longer felt so inclined to beat herself up over the smallest imperfections that surrounded her. She'd lived with the Avengers in New York for almost two weeks, and it was beginning to feel safer, homier. But the burden of knowing that she could have done more to stop Ultron from burning her world to the ground haunted her still. And she had the nightmares to prove it.

During the past night, her head filled with a dark mist and even darker pictures, any light banished or contorted into evil shadows. She thrashed in her bed, shouts for help leaving her mouth, yet she still she suffered in her own silence. No matter how safe she became to feel, her chest still queezed her tight, and her lungs became taut.

Wanda fought through the dead dreams of Pietro's lifeless body alone. She had no one else to comfort her. To be honest, she hadn't minded because she thought nobody else could possibly share the trauma she'd experienced. Damn has she been wrong.