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It all started when Natasha left her bracelets at the park.
"We'll get it later," all the grown-ups said. They didn't understand how important her bracelets were. If Thor had left his hammer they would have gone back to get it, but Natasha was quiet and she didn't cause problems, so they just said 'later' and expected her to wait.
Natasha didn't like waiting.
She wasn't supposed to go to the park alone. Everyone said that. She was just a little girl. The park could be dangerous.
But Natasha knew better. She didn't need anyone to protect her.
So she waited until Bruce threw a tantrum and everyone was busy trying to get him to calm down. The only person who would have noticed she was gone was Clint, and he was busy trying to get his suction arrows back from Reed Richards, who always seemed to grab them no matter how far away Clint aimed. For a second she considered staying back, to give Clint backup, but then she thought about her bracelets again. She took the opportunity to slip away.
Natasha had walked to the park with grown-ups a hundred million times, so it wasn't hard to get there. They went at least once a day from school. She only had to cross one street, and there were enough other kids crossing that she blended right in. Natasha was good at being sneaky.
The playground was small, and it was easy to come up with a strategy. The big kids were at the tire swing, so she'd want to avoid that. The rope web that led to the platform by the swirly slide was too exposed. But she could use the jungle gym for surveillance, and the monkey bars would be good for quick escape once she'd gotten what she wanted.
The bracelets were probably near the sandbox; that was where she and Clint had been during hide and seek. They'd won, of course. They always won. They were great at finding hiding places together. Today, in exchange for a juice box and half an Oreo, Matt Murdock had agreed to build a sandcastle right on top of them. The look on everyone's faces when they came out of the sandbox was even worth the bath they had to take after.
If the bracelets weren't in the sandbox... well, Natasha was good at coming up with a plan B on the spot. She had been since before she learned the alphabet.
As she'd expected, though, the bracelets were right underneath the red pail and shovel that Matt always liked to use. But before she could leave, she was distracted by the other unfamiliar thing in the sandbox: a teddy bear.
Well, most of a teddy bear.
It was covered in bite marks and dog drool, but Natasha wasn't scared. She leaned closer. It smelled like wet dog, but that wasn't bad, not really. She brushed some of the sand off it- it needed a bath even more than she had, yuck- and cradled it carefully against her chest. No, not it; this was a he, she was sure. Stuffing was coming out of his side, at the place where his other arm had once been attached. Natasha carefully pinched the fabric together so more didn't fall out. Mostly, she thought, he just looked sad, like he needed a friend.
"You can't say anything, okay?" she asked him. "I know it hurts, but they can't find out that I left and got you. I'll fix you later, okay?"
He didn't answer, which she figured was the best agreement she was going to get.
"Okay," she said. "Come with me."
It was harder to get back with the bear in her arms- she only had one hand to grab everything with now- but it wasn't impossible. Natasha was excellent at being sneaky, everyone said so, and the bear was pretty good too. She bet he was a super spy, like Bond from the movies.
"I'm going to call you James," she told him quietly as she nestled him into her cubby. "I'll pick you up after school, okay?"
When she slipped back into the classroom, Bruce was finally winding down, and Clint and Reed were in separate time-outs. That was the other part of being quiet and not causing problems, the really good part: no one even noticed she'd been missing.
Natasha smiled.
*
After naptime, which Natasha and Clint spent sharing messages through the secret secret code they made up after they were told they couldn't make any noise, they played house with Bobbi. (Some kids said it didn't count as playing house when they were just preparing for someone to break in, but they used pots and pans to defend the kitchen playset from invaders, so Natasha thought it counted just fine.) Then it was time for art. Natasha painted a beautiful butterfly, just because she liked watching everyone's reactions when she did something girly. She gave it bright purple wings so that Clint would take it home if she didn't want it. At story time they read The Very Grouchy Ladybug and Scott Summers made a joke about black widows eating bugs and Clint punched him because Clint was her best friend. It was a very busy day. But she didn't forget about James, sitting all alone in her cubby.
When she got home she went into the toy box in the big red playroom and found an old baby doll that was missing its head. (For some reason, things like that seemed to happen there a lot.) She pulled off its arm and tried to hold it in place on James. When it wouldn't stay, she went into the big box of art supplies and found a huge roll of duct tape. She wrapped it around and around and around until the arm stayed attached to his fur.
It still didn't look quite right, so she got out a marker and carefully drew a star on his shoulder. The star was bright red, just like his pants. Just like the room. He fit, here.
"You're beautiful," she informed the bear. He would definitely use the arm better than any stupid baby doll could.
Natasha knew she was too grown-up to sleep with teddy bears, so she made sure no one saw James. She hid him underneath her backpack whenever she thought anyone might come by. When she was in bed, though, she pulled him under the covers with her and squeezed. He made her feel safe.
Not that she needed anyone else to make her feel safe. But it was still nice to know he was there.
*
Natasha kept James secret for a week. When she was at home she hid him in her backpack by the foot of her bed; at school, in her cubby behind her jacket and her lunch. Nothing changed in her life, at least that anyone could see. She played hide and seek with Clint. She played pilots with Carol and went on a trip all around the world. She looked at bugs with Peter. She sat in the book corner with Bruce, who was really very nice when he wasn't cranky, and they looked at pictures together. She spent her days in class and her afternoons in the red room and everything was normal.
But at night, she had James. She liked who she was around him- not just a quiet kid, not just a girl, not Clint's friend. She was Natasha. If she sometimes woke up with duct tape tangled in her hair, well, that was a small price to pay for having someone to hold onto at night when the dark felt like it was everywhere and she felt alone.
("Even big kids feel alone sometimes," she imagined him saying to her. "But you aren't alone. You're with me.")
Natasha felt like she came alive then. When there weren't any other people around, she could be a superhero or a ballerina or a gymnast or just a normal kid and it was all okay. She didn't have to pay attention to how the other kids saw her because it was just James and James already knew her. She was used to hiding, but except with Clint, she wasn't used to being found.
*
Things probably could have continued like that forever, but that was when Steve showed up.
His eyes were red-rimmed and he looked like he'd been crying, so Natasha figured he was just another new kid who wasn't used to being away from home and surrounded by strangers. She'd been the new kid, not that long ago, and she knew what it was like. She wasn't going to go over to him and introduce herself or anything, but she would check in on him during naptime, make sure he had someone to lie with. She and Clint didn't mind sharing their mats with someone from time to time. He could even borrow her crayons, if he didn't have his own.
But it turned out he wasn't new at all. Steve had been at the preschool a billion years ago, before Natasha had started there, so everyone already knew him, even though they said he looked different now. Natasha didn't know what to make of him; he was bigger than everyone but Thor, but he carried himself like he didn't really know it. He seemed shy, even though all the other kids seemed to adore him. And he didn't seem to see any problem in admitting his own weakness.
Despite herself, Natasha was fascinated.
Everyone swarmed Steve, full of questions about what he'd been up to since they'd last seen him. Natasha held back, like she always did, because this was a new situation, and the best way to deal with those was to listen and watch. She went to the dress-up corner and wrapped an elegant feather boa around herself in different ways, less to see how it looked than to have something to do. It was a good place to go when you didn't want to be noticed; no one but Janet ever came back there anyway.
Steve had spent the past six months in Europe, which was a far-away place that you could only get to with airplanes. Natasha thought it might have been like Russia, where she was from, but she wasn't sure. It wasn't like she was going to say anything anyway. She just listened absently while Steve told them about his time away, getting more and more excited and looking less and less like the scared little boy he'd seemed when he first came in.
He was almost done with a story about the friends he'd made in Europe when, from the block corner, Tony piped up with a question. "Hey, Steve, where's Bucky Bear?"
Natasha was standing in front of the full-body mirror, angled so that she could focus on Steve's reflection. So she saw how, as soon as Tony asked that, Steve's entire face crumpled. Then the words all came out in a rush: "I know I packed him but I haven't seen him since we moved back home and my mommy said he must have just been in another box but we opened all the boxes and he's not anywhere and Mommy said she'd get me a new one and even make him the same uniform but it won't be the same and I want my Bucky Bear."
If Natasha's hands were shaking as she put on the special hat, the one with the netting that looked a bride's veil, well, at least no one was looking at her to see.
Natasha wasn't sure how she thought the other kids would react, but she was surprised to see them all take it as hard as Steve seemed to. Even Wade said "man, that's rough," and she didn't think Wade took anything seriously.
But she didn't get any details until naptime, when she could talk to Clint with the ultra-super-secret code.
According to Clint, Bucky Bear was a soft brown teddy bear with shiny black eyes and a bright blue coat. He was Steve's best friend in the entire world. Every time Steve played superhero, Bucky Bear was his sidekick. Every time Steve played dress-up, he made sure Bucky Bear got a hat or a scarf. Every time Steve put on a smock for painting, he put one on Bucky Bear too, to protect his fur. And every time Steve had to take a nap, Bucky Bear was right at his side.
Natasha looked over at Steve, awake even though his mat was right in between Sharon's and Sam's in the book corner, which everyone knew was the best spot for naptime. He clutched at his blanket and looked like he was trying not to cry. Natasha didn't like the feeling that gnawed inside her belly.
"Did Bucky Bear have a mask?" Natasha asked Clint as they rolled up their mats at the end of naptime.
"Yeah, a black one. Why?"
"No reason." Natasha thought about James, sitting in her cubby. She didn't even know Steve. She didn't have to do anything for him. But she did know James, and if James really was Bucky, then Steve was his best friend. She thought about someone keeping her from Clint, and her tummy twisted again.
But Natasha was good at coming up with plans. She'd talk to Steve. She could figure out her options later.
*
It would have been easier if Natasha could have planned her talk with Steve, but it snuck up on her. Most of the class was playing freeze tag, while Natasha hung back to evaluate, and she was surprised to see Steve did too. He walked over near her, and then hesitated, like he was worried she didn't want him there.
"You don't like tag?" Natasha asked. Most boys who were good at running liked the game. That either meant that despite his body, Steve wasn't good at running, or else- she didn't know what it meant otherwise. That was confusing; Natasha always knew what things meant. She bit her lip to keep from frowning.
"Tag's okay," Steve said. "I don't like freeze tag too much though. I used to, but since I got back- I'd just rather be in or out."
Natasha nodded. That made sense. "I'm Natasha," she added after a moment.
"I'm Steve."
"You can sit with me if you want." She patted the patch of grass she was sitting on. It was far enough from home base that no one would kick them, and there was more than enough room for two.
"Thanks," he said.
It was too good an opportunity to pass up, Natasha knew. There wouldn't be many times when she would be alone with him, where she could ask him questions and tell him answers and not have the entire school involved. But even though she knew it was time, she wasn't ready. Not quite yet. "Do you like your new house?" she asked him finally.
"It's okay," Steve said. "The neighbor has a scary dog, though."
Natasha made a face. She didn't like dogs. They didn't make any sense; nothing she'd learned about how to manage people worked on them. "What kind?" she asked.
"I dunno." Steve shrugged. "His name is Lukin," he said. "He's really really big and sometimes he barks at night and it wakes me up. Also he ate three flowers out of my mommy's garden. She says we're going to build a fence."
Maybe the dog ate Bucky Bear too, Natasha thought. Maybe he ate the bear just like the flowers and I found a completely different bear and he's mine now. After all, Steve had a mommy who packed boxes and kept gardens and loved him and would make sure he got a brand new Bucky. Didn't Natasha deserve one measly teddy bear?
But no other bear was like Bucky. Natasha could see that. No other bear had matted fur and smelled like dog slobber and still managed to be the best bear in the world.
"Dogs are scary," she said.
"Not all of them." Steve grinned almost shyly. "When I was away my neighbor there had a dog and I was scared at first but then once I met him he just licked my face and then played fetch with me. He didn't hurt anything."
"That you saw," Natasha corrected. "You didn't see him hurt anyone." She realized as she spoke that it might have sounded mean, but she wasn't being mean. It was just the truth. She never understood why the truth upset people so much.
Steve didn't seem offended, though. "No," he said. "Erskine was nice. If he was here instead of Lukin, my mommy would still have all her flowers."
And you'd still have your Bucky Bear.
"I have a tummy ache," Natasha said. It was as good an excuse as any to get up and walk away.
*
She imagined hiding him on her shelf, somewhere between the red plastic skeleton left over from Halloween and the Yelena doll that she wasn't allowed to take out of the room. Then she imagined someone finding him. She imagined a trail of cotton stuffing, leading away. She imagined finding a baby doll's arm, covered in duct tape, lying on the floor.
The red room wasn't a good place for Ja- for Bucky Bear. It wasn't a good place for any teddy bear. But it especially wasn't good for him.
*
Natasha gave Bruce her juice box, and promised him he could have her cookies after, if he threw a tantrum big enough to distract everyone while she sneaked out to her cubby. He told her she could keep her cookies as long as she'd read with him later. When she offered to share them while they read together, his entire face lit up like it was more than just a simple trade. Bruce was nice. Sometimes, Natasha thought that Bruce might be almost kind of maybe her friend.
Natasha had hoped to get it over with first thing, but after she thought about it, she asked Bruce to wait until after the trip to the playground. As part of Clint's stealthy assault on Reed, she climbed silently to the top of the jungle gym, right to the place where she could give suggestions or even jump off of if emergency backup was needed.
Clint's plan called for him to wait in the sandbox until Reed moved into position, so Natasha just stood back and watched. She saw him gesturing at Matt, like he'd forgotten Matt couldn't see him. And she saw Steve, handing Matt the red pail and shovel he'd almost misplaced, and saying something to Clint that made him burst out laughing even in the middle of Operation Stretchy.
As they filed back inside, Natasha nodded solemnly at Bruce. It was time.
Bruce was a fan of the classics, so he colored silently until his green crayon snapped. His lip started trembling immediately, but he was able to wink at Natasha before he let out his first cry. "Thank you," she mouthed before getting out of the way.
She waited until he started smashing things, and then slipped to the back of the crowd. Steve was just like everyone else, trying to see what was going on with Bruce, but when Natasha put a hand on his arm, he obediently peeled off the group to follow her.
"I need to show you something," she said quietly. "Come with me."
Steve looked at her suspiciously. He didn't like to break rules unless there was a good reason. Luckily, this was a good reason. Natasha pointed at the clock. "We'll be back before the big hand gets to the seven, I promise. And Bruce won't stop 'til the big hand is at the eight, at least." She was sure of that; two Oreos were resting on it. "And if not, we tell them we had to go to the potty for an emergency."
"Let's go, then," Steve said. His face looked like it did when he played Army Captain, nothing but sheer determination. But he let Natasha lead. That was how she knew, deep in her gut, that this was the right choice.
It was almost too simple. The door was cracked open for a breeze, so it was easy for Natasha to push it far enough for them to slip out. Her cubby was just down the hall. While Steve waited, she carefully removed her jacket, then the brown bag with her lunch, and finally, at the very back, the bear.
"I think this is yours," Natasha said quietly as she handed it to him.
She didn't know how to explain the look on Steve's face. It wasn't quite happy, or sad, or mad- it was all of them at once, and something else she didn't understand. "I found him at the park last week," she said. "I didn't know he was yours."
She realized as she spoke that her plan had been stupid. She didn't know how she hadn't realized it before. Steve didn't know her. He had no reason to believe that she hadn't stolen the doll herself. And, well, hadn't she? She didn't show him to anyone. She didn't try to find who he belonged to. She just took him for herself, because he made her feel safe, even though Steve probably needed him more than she did. Natasha felt that awful feeling in her chest, like she was going to start crying, even though she knew was too old for that, especially in front of anyone. She hated how it felt, pushing against her ribcage like she was a baby. She wasn't. She was a big girl. Big girls didn't do this.
"I'm going back in," she made herself say. "The big hand's probably on the seven already."
Steve didn't move. He was just looking at Bucky Bear, like he had all the answers to all the questions in the universe in his hands.
Natasha curled up in the book corner, and held Corduroy in front of her face until she felt sure it wouldn't betray her anymore.
*
It was harder than usual to keep busy that day, but Natasha had never been one to let difficulty get in the way of doing what needed to be done. She understood that actions had consequences, and if that meant that Steve was never going to talk to her again, well, that was just what it meant. If Steve being mad at her meant no one else would talk to her, well, she had brought that on herself, hadn't she?
So she gave Bruce her cookies and looked at Shrek with him, because it was his favorite picture book even if she thought it was kind of silly. During hide and seek she made sure someone saw her so that Clint could be the 100%, no-questions-asked best hide and seek player ever, and he was so happy he didn't even care that she'd done it on purpose. She let Tony win the argument about what would be the best superpower to have, even though he was clearly wrong, because Tony liked winning arguments more than he cared about actually being right. And even though she saw the spider first, she let Peter be the one to pick it up and show everyone how cool it was.
If it was going to be her last day of them being friends, at least she'd made it a good one.
When she got home she went straight to the red room. She didn't think about the bear. She just practiced ballet moves until her arms and legs ached and she could barely remember her own name.
When she slept her arms felt empty, but she knew it was what she deserved.
*
Natasha didn't want to go to school the next morning, but she didn't particularly want to stay in the red room either. Besides, big girls didn't just decide not to go to school. So she brushed her hair and put on her bracelets and packed her bag (the backpack felt emptier than usual) and went in like normal.
When she got in, Clint tackled her. This is it, she thought, bracing herself, squeezing her eyes shut and reminding herself that she wasn't going to hurt him back no matter what happened.
"Tasha, stop playing around, look," he said, and she finally opened her eyes. He was holding three of his favorite suction arrows right in front of her face.
"What?" she asked warily.
"I wanted to play and Reed tried to take the arrows but Steve got there first and told him they were mine and he couldn't have them and Sue overheard and now she won't talk to Reed and Reed's upset and he isn't even trying to get to my arrows anymore and it's the best thing ever."
Natasha froze. "Congratulations," she said finally, forcing herself to keep her voice from wobbling. It wasn't like Clint to be this cruel, to rub in the fact that Steve was his friend now and doing it better than she had ever been able to. She had expected to be ignored, but she couldn't have predicted this.
He gave her a weird look, like she'd said something he hadn't expected, but before he could quiz her, he looked up and noticed another figure nearby. She felt goosebumps all over and tried not to even breathe.
"Johnny!" Clint shouted, bouncing up off of Natasha. "Did you see what your sister did?"
Natasha blinked hard. For a second, Johnny had looked just like Steve. Her mind was playing tricks on her again.
Bruce was in the book corner, and he gave her a timid smile. She saw he had Madeline on his lap- her favorite. She wasn't sure what game he was playing, but she wasn't going to let herself be vulnerable. She'd done that already, and look what happened.
There were a lot of stuffed animals in the classroom. None of them were like James, obviously, and all of them were kind of babyish (you're too old for that, Natasha), but some were okay. Peter had first dibs on the stuffed spider at naptime, but he didn't ever take it til after lunch, so Natasha didn't feel bad picking it up, putting it in her lap, and wrapping her arms around it.
The spider's legs had wire in them so you could pose it however you wanted, even though that sometimes made it poke you where you didn't want it to poke. But its head felt like a velvet pillow, and when Natasha squished it against her face nothing hurt. The spider wasn't a he; it was just an it. But that was better than nothing.
She knew better than to not pay attention, knew better than to get lost in any sensation, but the spider was soft and it was fluffy and she didn't realize anyone was near her until she felt the hand on her arm.
Natasha did not jump. She was not the kind of person who jumped. But she still felt her heart leap. "Steve," she said quietly. She should have known ignoring was too much to hope for. She tried to stop her stomach from clenching up.
"Can I talk to you?" he asked.
He had the bear now, Natasha reminded herself. She didn't need to be nice. "You're talking to me right now," she said.
"Alone," he said. "If you don't mind."
Natasha swallowed. "During hide and seek," she said. "Find me and we'll talk."
She didn't say she'd make it easy.
*
Steve tried to be her buddy to walk to the playground, but Natasha was faster than he was. As soon as she saw Steve walking toward her, Natasha grabbed Tandy's hand. Tandy usually walked with Ty, but she took Natasha's hand agreeably. Tandy and Ty usually just played by themselves. Maybe, Natasha thought, they would play with her even if no one else would. Maybe they'd play with her now. But even as she considered that, Tandy was running off to join Ty playing under his cloak.
Natasha knew instinctively where she should hide, but she also knew that that was wrong; if she'd thought of it, Clint had too, and she didn't want to make things any more awkward than they already were. Which meant that she had to do something daring and stupid.
Luckily, daring and stupid was one of Natasha's best moves.
She scaled the rope web quickly, and then, after glancing around to make sure no one was looking, she dropped her body down one side and adjusted her handholds so that she was hanging upside down. Then she kicked up her legs, to rest them on the underside of the platform where (she could hear it) all of the kids were congregating for the swirly slide. She could feel their stomping feet vibrating through the wood. No one would see her here. She breathed shallowly, willing herself to be invisible.
"Hi," said a voice by her ear.
If Natasha were any less skilled, she would have fallen down in shock. But instead she just stared. It looked like he'd shimmied up the bottom of the slide. She hadn't considered that an entry point. That was a flaw in her thinking.
"I found you," Steve said. "So we can talk, right?"
Rules were rules. "Yeah," Natasha said. "We can talk."
"Can we go someplace else to talk?" he asked. "It's loud here."
"No," Natasha said. "We talk here." It was maybe a whole five feet to the ground. But Natasha chose to live dangerously, and if Steve wanted to yell at her that bad, he was going to have to do it on her terms.
Now she was here, and bracing herself, and to her surprise, Steve looked like he was at a loss for words. Natasha didn't understand that; he hadn't seemed like the kind of guy to march into battle without a plan. But she didn't know Steve well at all. Maybe that was what he just did.
"I just- I wanted to thank you," he said.
If Natasha had trusted herself any fraction less than she did, she would have thought she was mishearing. But Natasha had learned to trust her instincts. They were the only things that didn't lie to her. "What?"
"For saving Bucky Bear," Steve said. "I know you're really mad at me for taking your doll away and probably never want to speak to me again, but-"
"No," Natasha said. She didn't like mind games, and whatever Steve was trying to do here, it wasn't something that she could deal with just by waiting him out. "You're mad at me for stealing your bear."
And Steve actually looked confused. "Why would I be mad at you?" he asked. "You found Bucky Bear. You didn't know he was mine. You took care of him. And when you found out he was mine you gave him to me."
"I don't know what kind of trick this is-"
"Natasha, it's not a trick," he said, and he sounded so firm and so honest that even though she had trained herself not to believe anyone, Natasha thought it sounded like the truth.
She hung in silence for a moment, letting the footsteps on the platform above her fill her head with white noise. "He's the best bear in the world," she said finally. "And you're his favorite person."
Steve blushed, he actually blushed, at that. "Really?"
"It's obvious," Natasha said.
"I always knew he was my favorite," Steve said quietly. "I didn't know I was his."
And that, Natasha thought, that was why everyone- even Tony, even Wade- liked Steve. Because he was the kind of guy who took the best care of a teddy bear any stuffed animal could ask for, but still didn't take it for granted that he would be their favorite human. "You are," she said. "Promise."
Natasha didn't like promising things to people. Promises only led to people feeling hurt when you broke them. But she could tell Steve needed it, and besides, it was the truth.
"What did you call him?" Steve asked. "Before you knew his name was Bucky, I mean."
"James."
Steve looked thoughtful. "James Bucky Bear. I like the sound of that."
"Where is he?" Natasha asked. "I thought you'd be carrying him everywhere."
Steve looked embarrassed. "I didn't want you to think I was showing off that I had him. And I thought everyone would be mad at me for taking your things and they wouldn't want to be my friend anymore."
"But he was your bear."
"So you thought I was mad at you for taking Bucky, and I thought you were mad at me for taking him?"
When Steve said it like that, it did sound kind of silly. It wasn't entirely true- she knew that the way her stomach flopped every time he called the bear Bucky wasn't just worry that he was mad at her- but it was a lot better than fighting. And at least this meant Clint wasn't mad at her. "I guess so," Natasha said. She made herself smile and hoped it didn't look as lopsided as it felt.
Then playground time was over. Natasha and Steve waited until the feet above them stopped pounding, and then dropped down to the ground while everyone else swarmed to be first in line. It was a long jump, but neither of them got hurt.
"Friends?" Steve asked as they headed toward the back of the line.
"Yeah," Natasha said. "Okay."
And without her even thinking about it, her hand found Clint's as he pulled her next to him in line. He was her line buddy. He would always be her line buddy. That was how it worked.
"Everything okay with you and Steve?" Clint asked.
"Yeah," Natasha said. "We're good."
"And you and me?"
Natasha knew no one else would recognize the flicker of uncertainty in Clint's eyes. But she wasn't anyone else. "We're always good, Hawkeye."
He squeezed her hand tight.
At naptime she and Clint used their extra-ultra-super-secret code to come up with a game that involved her bracelets and his arrows, and they didn't get told to settle down even once. At free play, she settled in with Bruce, and they looked at Madeline and the Bad Hat together, telling each other their own versions of the story. And at the end of the day, she exchanged a secret smile with Steve.
Going to the red room wasn't so bad that night. There was a place in her mind she could go to that no one else could get into.
*
The next morning at school, Steve showed up beaming, one hand holding his new frisbee. It was pretty awesome. It was red and blue with a shiny white star in the middle, and Steve was really good at throwing it. But if anyone besides Natasha noticed that, they didn't say anything. They were focused on his other hand.
"Bucky Bear!" shouted Tony. He abandoned the robot he was building with and ran over. He wasn't the only one.
"He got found!" Steve said proudly. "He got all hurt while he was missing but my mommy fixed him."
Natasha's stomach tightened. She wasn't sure she wanted to see. A damaged bear had a little bit of her in it, clinging to the empty edges. A toy with two matching arms- that would be his, one hundred percent.
Steve held the bear up like a trophy, and everyone but Natasha looked. She kept her eyes cast down, focusing on the red triangles on her sneakers. She imagined patterns with them, connecting at the points and the edges to make new shapes.
At least, she did until she heard Thor ask, "What happened to his arm?" Then she couldn't have stopped herself from looking even if she'd wanted to.
It didn't make sense. The left arm was the same as it had always been, but the right arm didn't look right at all. It was gray, the soft material of tee shirts that have been through the wash a few times, and a bright red felt star was sewn onto the shoulder. Natasha stared at it, confused.
"He already lost that arm once," Steve explained. "I didn't want to confuse him any more."
It was ridiculous, Natasha knew, for Steve to do this. To intentionally let his toy be less than perfect, just because of something she'd done. It was stupid and pointless and-
She could feel him smiling at her, just at her, and she felt suddenly shy. Natasha had a lot of secrets, but they were secrets that were just hers, or secrets she shared with Clint. Having a secret with another person felt a lot like falling off the jungle gym without knowing where the ground was.
Steve was busy showing everyone Bucky Bear's new arm, so Natasha busied herself elsewhere. This time she and Carol flew all around the whole galaxy, and she and Clint and Bobbi set up an elaborate trap that totally would have worked if they hadn't been told to stop because someone was going to get hurt, like that wasn't the whole point.
At naptime, she set up next to Clint like usual, but to her surprise Steve came over to her other side. He was holding Bucky Bear in his arms and looked uncertain.
"Do you want to hold him?" Steve asked.
Natasha considered it. She really considered it. But he was Steve's. "No, I'm okay."
"You can borrow him if you want, you know," Steve said. "Overnight, I mean. If you need him. Or now."
Natasha imagined taking him back to the red room. The picture wasn't very happy. "No," she said. "He's yours first. He should stay with you."
"Well, then," Steve said, "I was wondering- I mean, you're probably busy- I don't-"
"What?" Natasha asked.
"Want to come over sometime?" Steve asked. "My mommy got me new toy soldiers."
Natasha thought of how scary going someplace new would be. She thought of the mean scary dog next door and about having to listen to whatever rules Steve's mommy came up with. She felt like a bazillion butterflies were flying around her belly. "Yes," she said before she could change her mind. She spoke like it didn't matter, like it was just a word that didn't have all the meaning in the world.
Steve's smile was blinding.
"We could play war," Natasha said. "All three of us." The bear, she thought, would be a particularly good fighter. He seemed scrappy.
"No, we can't do that," Steve said.
Natasha felt cold tendrils of fear coil up in her stomach. A chance to do something outside the red room, and now she'd ruined it almost before they even started. "Why not?" she asked, keeping her voice as quiet and neutral as possible.
"Our side would be you and me and James Bucky Bear," Steve said, like it was the most logical thing in the world. "Who would go to war against that?" With that, he snuggled up with Bucky Bear, leaving her to ponder the way that it wasn't her stomach this time, but her heart, which felt like it might explode.
When she rolled over to look at Clint, she saw that he was worried. Natasha felt bad. She hated that she'd made him worry.
"Are you okay?" he asked her with her uber-extra-ultra-super-secret code.
"Yeah," she replied, reaching out to hold his hand, and she felt the tension slide out of his grip. "I think I am."