Love Grown Cold

Drafted, Not Drafted

Several years later, at the beginning of WWII
Natasha was walking home, trying to ignore the sounds of her own thoughts. James is drafted and leaving tomorrow. That was the thought that had been spinning around her head for hours now. She had said her goodbyes already and Bucky was taking Steve on one last double date with a few girls he had met. He had told Nat that she could come along, but for once, Natasha didn't think she had it in her to watch Bucky flirting with another girl.

And Steve is still trying to get drafted too. That was almost as depressing. She knew why of course. He wanted to be on the front, fighting for his country alongside Bucky. But if he did manage to get drafted (which he hadn't so far, but he was very determined) that would leave her home alone, trying to figure out what to do with her life while her best friends, her only friends, were risking their lives for a fight she couldn't partake in.

Nat sighed. She felt so useless. It was an uncommon feeling for her, as she was usually in the thick of things (being Steve's friend/sister did have its uses). If Steve gets drafted, I'll just have to find a way to join them. How could she know that she would get her opportunity the very next day?
                                   *
"They drafted you?" Natasha asked Steve the next morning at breakfast. It had gotten late last night so she hadn't waited for her brother to get home. This was the first she had heard of his recruitment and she wasn't sure how she felt.

Steve nodded eagerly. "Yeah, I went back to the Draftboard last night after that double date thing to try again, and some doctor came in and asked me why I wanted to go so badly, and then he cleared me!"

"Wow," was all Nat managed to say. "When do you leave?"

"Tomorrow, early," Steve said, not noticing her trepidation about this. "So I need to get a few things packed today."

Nat nodded thoughtfully. "What did you say the name of this doctor was?"

Steve thought for a moment. "Erskine I think. I'm not quite sure, but I think that's right."

Natasha smiled at Steve for the first time that morning. "Are you excited?"

"Yeah, but kind of nervous too. I hope I make it through training."

"You'll do fine." Nat reassured him, though in reality, her mind was far away. "Tell you what. I'm going to go to the store and pick up a few things and when I get back and you're done packing, we'll go do something fun."

Steve grinned. "Sounds great."

It only took a few minutes for Nat to grab her stuff and rush out the door. Yes, she was going to go to the grocery store, but first she was going to go check out this Dr. Erskine's office. And by check out, she meant break in. After getting out of sight of the apartment, Natasha ducked into an alleyway and made a quick transformation from "respectable girl" to "youngish newspaper boy". After stashing her clothes in a secret hole, she calmly headed to the Draftboard building.

She eyed the building as she approached it. It wasn't a relatively tall building, which if she needed to climb would be great, but was also a rather obvious one, which wasn't such a great thing.

Great, she thought. Now I have to go in the building to find his office. They should really put signs on the outside of the building. It only took her a minute to make her way inside and convince the receptionist that she had a message for Dr. Erskine.

"You can go up to his office and drop the telegram there, but I'm not sure if he's in today." The receptionist warned her.

"That's all right," Natasha said, pitching her voice a little lower and adding a slight twang to it. "I'll just slip it under the door if'n he ain't there. What room did you say?"