Never Safe

Chapter Thirteen

"God, Steve, I hate you!"

"Cmon, be nice" Steve laughed.

"No, I don't wanna play anymore" you frowned.

"Fine. Off to bed."

"Whatever, I'll pay you" you sighed and handed over the money you owed him in monopoly.

"No, I think it's time we come to a stop. It's a school night so you don't wanna be in bed too late."

"It's fine, I'm not going to school" you shrugged and handed the dice over to Natasha. She glanced at Steve, and didn't roll. "Come on, let's just finish the game" you said.

Natasha still didn't move. You looked at Steve.

"I think-"

You suddenly stood up, shoving back your chair, and you stormed off to your room. Steve sighed and started packing up the monopoly board.

"I'm gonna try talk to her" Nat decided. She walked off to find you before Steve said anything.

You were in your own room now rather than Bucky's. The door was open so Natasha just entered without knocking. You were sat on your bed, hugging your knees against your chest. You turned your head to look at the wall when you saw Nat. She came and sat next to you.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

You hesitated before replying. "I don't want to go to school tomorrow."

Nat didn't say anything, so you faced her. "I need to be here when he gets home."

Natasha had an idea. A stupid one. But it might just work. "Okay, I'm gonna be honest with you but you can't get mad."

"Okay."

"Promise?"

"Mhm."

"Bucky probably isn't okay. It's been days since he was supposed to be back and no one's heard anything from him. If everything was alright, someone would at least know where he is. But no one does..."

You looked mildly horrified. Yet Natasha continued.

"So you can stay in denial. You can sit at home thinking he'll be back any minute. Or you can face reality and go to school as though everything's normal because that's what he'd want you to do."

"So, what you're saying is, my brother may be dead but I should go to school and act like I don't care?"

"No. No, that's not- I may have worded that poorly... Bucky isn't-" Natasha took a deep breath, figuring out how to fix this. "Bucky may not be okay right now, we don't know. But he will be. Because he's done this so many times before. He's strong, and extremely capable. He's brave. What I'm saying is, he'd want you to be brave too. He'd want you not to worry about him. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying not to worry. I'm trying to be brave. Because honestly, I'm a little terrified. I don't want anything to happen to him. The longer it takes for him to come home, the more I regret our last conversation. I love him and I need him to be okay."

Halfway through her little speech, Natasha had picked up one of your hands in both of hers. As she neared the end, she started squeezing it tighter. You could see she was scared too. You weren't alone.

You leaned over and tightly wrapped your arms around her. It took her a moment to process what you were doing, but then she hugged you back.

Over your shoulder, she saw Steve standing in the doorway and she smiled at him. He came over and sat down on your other side. You pulled away from Natasha.