A Lost Marriage|Romanogers AU

School...and Something Worse

For five years, the three families had a symbiotic routine. A nanny would watch Natasha during the day while Steve and Bucky would go to school. When they came back, they would spend time with Natasha to save money on the nanny. In return, Natasha's mother would make dinners for them. 

When Natasha turned five, it was time for her to go to school. She was excited to finally go to the place where Steve and Bucky went for hours everyday, but they made it clear to her that she shouldn't be too excited. That was how it was at the beginning anyway. 

A few days before school started, Steve found her sitting near a window looking sad.

"Hey Nat, what's wrong?" He asked, pulling on one of her curls. She swatted his hand away.

"I don't wanna go to school anymore," she said. Steve laughed. He was 11 years old and in the 6th grade. He knew it wasn't that bad. 

"Did Bucky and I scare you away? Nat you're so smart, you'll do amazing," he said. Natasha shook her head.

"My mom signed me up for a ballet school across town. I heard someone call it boarding school. If I go there, I'll only see you and Bucky and Mom once a month," she explained. Steve could see that she was upset about it, and the thought saddened him. Natasha had grown on him and he didn't want her to go anywhere. Pushing these feelings aside, he pulled her from the window and gave her a hug. She was growing fast while he was growing slow, and she came up to just under his chin.

"Listen Nat, you'll be learning how to dance like those girls on TV, and you'll still have us around whenever we can visit. And we'll still love you just as much as if we were together everyday. Okay?" Nat nodded. She squeezed Steve tightly and he grunted. He wasn't prepared for her strong five year old grip.

"I love you, Steve," she said with childish admiration. Steve smiled.

"I love you too, Nat. Now let's go find Bucky and see what he's up to." Natasha still wasn't happy about boarding school, but she was comforted by Steve's words. She wasn't so scared anymore, knowing that the people she loved the most would be waiting for her.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next week, Natasha went to the ballet school. She found that she actually enjoyed ballet quite a bit. She was good at it and was constantly praised by her teachers. 

For the school year, she had ballet everyday, and her education included geography, history, mathematics, science, and many other subjects.

Natasha quite enjoyed school, but her favorite part was the 2nd Saturday of every month, when Steve, Bucky, and her mom would come visit her. They would spend a few hours together and talk about everything. Sometimes it was just Steve and Bucky because her mom couldn't get out of work long enough, and on those days the three of them got milkshakes from a diner. 

"So Nat, how's ballet school?" Bucky asked, taking a big gulp of his milkshake. 

"It's good." She replied. "I like ballet. I also made some friends!" She gave them the names of all her friends. They listened to her talk with rapt attention. 

"...we're even doing a show with some people from the boys' boarding school!" she said. Steve and Bucky's heads snapped from their milkshakes to her face. She didn't notice and kept talking about costumes, but soon realized that something was wrong with them. 

"What?" She asked, confused as to why they both looked furious. "Is something wrong?" 

"So these boys..." Steve started. "Tell us about them." Natasha was confused as to why he cared about that, but did as he asked.