Let Me Love You

Unsure

Kate's POV

I wake up the next morning with a killer headache and turn to see Steve asleep beside me. A small smile forms on my face as I remember him taking care of me last night after when I started feeling sick again. I feel my breathing hitch in my chest as I realize that this will all be gone soon. I feel that unsettling feeling in my stomach and run to the bathroom once again.

I feel a hand on my back as someone holds my hair back and turn my head to see Steve beside me. I look him over and notice his slightly puffy eyes. Part of me still wishes that he didn't know but the other part of me is glad that he does.

Once I'm no longer throwing up, Steve helps me clean up before carrying me back to bed. He lays beside me and runs his fingers through my hair.

"I love you." He says, catching me off guard.

"W-What?" I ask, my heartbeat quickening.

He chuckles at me and leans down to kiss my forehead. "I said that I love you."

"You.. I.." Tears begin to form in my eyes as I process his words again and again. "You can't love me."

He furrows his eyebrows. "Yes I can. I have since the day I met you in that liquor store."

My breathing quickens as I stare into his eyes. "Steve.."

"I know what the circumstances are, that doesn't matter to me. All that matters is that you know how I feel before it's too late." He quotes part of my letter that he found.

"I.. I-" I suddenly feel a sharp pain in my chest. Steve yelling my name is the last thing I hear before everything goes black.

Steve's POV

"BUCKY!" I yell, watching Kate have a seizure on her bed. He runs into the room and begins to freak out.

"We need to get her down to Bruce and Tony." Bucky says. "NOW!" He rushes us.

Bucky scoops Kate up in his arms since I'm still panicking and we run into the elevator. Once we arrive at the sick bay, Tony pulls Bruce into a room where Bucky and I are standing with Kate on the bed. By this point she's stopped seizing.

Bruce runs over to her and checks for a pulse. "She's not breathing." He shouts, beginning compressions. Tony runs out of the room and quickly returns with an AED.

"I'll take over." He says, allowing Bruce to tend to the machine.

I watch nervously as Tony pumps her chest and breathes into her mouth. He and Bruce continue to perform CPR until there's finally a heartbeat detected on one of the machines. I let out a sigh of relief as her heart rate stabilizes.

"She needs to stay here, where I can keep an eye on her." Bruce says, checking her vitals before going back to what he was doing before. Tony follows him to continue their search for a cure. He hasn't gotten much sleep lately.

"You alright pal?" Bucky asks, placing a hand on my shoulder as I sit beside Kate.

"No." I admit, holding my head in my hands. "No, Buck, I'm not alright. I never thought I'd find love and now that I did, she's laying on a hospital bed, barely alive." Bucky wraps his arms around me in a hug and I hug him back, allowing my tears to fall. "I don't know what to do."

"Steve?" I hear a soft voice say from beside me and quickly let go of Bucky.

"Kate, oh my God, you're awake." I grab her hand. "You scared me."

She gives me a sympathetic smile and intertwines our fingers.

My heart skips a beat at her touch. I know she's still weak but I can't help myself. I press my lips to hers and she softly kisses back. After a few moments, I pull away to see a smile between her rosy cheeks.

"It's about time." Bucky says, smiling at the both of us.

"Shut up, jerk." He laughs as I punch his arm (not the metal one).

"Kitten! You're awake!" Tony kisses her cheek. "How are you feeling?"

"Not dead." She laughs but none of us do.

"Well.. You kinda were for a few minutes.." Bruce says.

"What?" She asks, her eyebrows furrowing.

"You don't remember?" I ask, she shakes her head. "You started seizing in your room so we brought you down here so Bruce could do whatever needed to be done but when he checked, you weren't breathing so he and Tony had to perform CPR on you." I explain, holding her hand.

"I.. I thought I just passed out." She says, her hands starting to shake.

"Hey, it's gonna be okay." I squeeze her hand but immediately pull my hand away when I feel a burning sensation. I look down at her hand to see a glow pulsing throughout her body.

"What's happening? What are you doing?" Bruce asks.

"I'm not doing anything." She says, visibly scared.

She begins to scream in pain and Bruce quickly pushes an anesthetic through her IV to calm her down. It only takes a few seconds before the glowing diminishes and she passes out.