Stronger- Steve Rogers x Reader
Hello hello no one reads this story but I write it for comfort and stuff. Well I love y'all anyways. Enjoy!
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A bead of sweat trickled down your forehead. This was one of many, and you payed it no attention, simply blinking it out of your eyes.
It was not until the door opened that you stopped for more than a few seconds.
"Hey."
A certain blond super soldier had come to pay you a visit, which surprised you.
Fewer and fewer people had come to see you, and recently that number had dwindled down drastically. It was like everyone had given up on you. You couldn't blame them.
"You've been here for a long time."
You paused slightly, shrugged and continued your relentless blows to the punching bag in front of you.
"Don't you think you should take a break?"
He stood there, persistent, determined to stop the strain on your body, and your mind. But you tried to pay him no mind and ignored him, and continued your grueling training.
"Y/N."
Finally, you answered. "What do you need?" Mumbling under your breath, you seemed very unlike yourself. Well, what you used to be, before... this happened to your body.
"Y/N, I need you to stop." Steve stepped closer. "Please."
Ignoring the lump that swelled up in your throat, you refused to look at him. One look into those pleading gorgeous eyes and you would be gone.
You had to keep on going. No one could stop you now.
No one wants to stop you. You're worthless. Work harder, you weak bitch. You'll never do anything right unless you stop being a pussy.
"Y/N?"
The tall man snapped you out of your self loathing thoughts, the ones you'd been having for ages. The only ones pushing your body to the harsh exercises you were doing now.
"Y/N!"
Not being able to take it anymore, he stepped forward and grabbed your arm firmly, but not painfully.
"Don't do this. You're going to hurt yourself."
Finally glaring into his concern filled blue eyes, you muttered out in a hoarse voice, "That's the point."
"No. Please! Why are you doing this?"
"Let me go."
You ripped your arm from his grasp,
tearing your gaze from your visitor. Your body longed to throw yourself into his arms, bury your face into his strong chest and just stay there. Forget about everything.
Forget about what happened.
Forget about the pain.
But that couldn't happen. You would never get him.
So you resisted the urge. Part of you felt satisfied. You resisted. You were getting stronger. It was working.
"Listen to me, you're doing more harm than good. Y/N, look at me. Please, stop."
Taking hold of your arm again, he tugged you away. Trying to free yourself from his grasp, you struggled and pulled yourself free. Determined to put an end to this, Steve wrapped his arms around your body and picked you up.
Carrying your thrashing, protesting body out of the training area and to the elevator, you dealt more than a few blows but he refused to let you harm yourself any longer.
After a few minutes, you stopped, succumbing to exhaustion. The rest of the elevator ride ended in silence, the only sound your heavy breathing.
Moments later, the super soldier set your limp body down into the soft sheets on your freshly made bed.
He walked into the bathroom, and you lied there, unmoving, too tired to get up. Your resistance had been worn out, leaving the exhaustion to crash down upon you.
Returning, he sat down beside you.
"Y/N, can you go take a bath?"
Your gaze flickered up to his, and dropped again, and you nodded wordlessly.
Dragging your battered, limping body to the bathroom, you closed the door without a word.
Steve had drawn a bath for you, and prepared some clean clothes to change into after.
Soaking into the hot water, your mind was empty of thought. It was like it was completely drained.
You were completely drained.
After drying yourself with a fluffy towel, you changed into the clothes Steve had prepared for you, which were one of his shirts, and a pair of comfortable shorts. And your underwear. You could almost imagine him blushing furiously and grabbing blindly for a pair, trying not to look.
You melded almost thoughtlessly with the routine, drying your hair, brushing it, brushing your teeth, applying lotion like you did it everyday.
Which you used to. All until... that happened. The mission, that led to your sacrifice and the pain that had lasted and still hadn't ended.
Come to think of it, you hadn't taken care of yourself or done normal things in a long time.
But why bother?
How could things ever be normal again?
You emerged from the bathroom, actually feeling a bit better, to find Steeb still perched on your bed waiting for you.
For a quiet second, you surveyed your room. The last time you had seen it it had been a mess, but now it was newly tidied. Everything neatly organized, cleaned, and dusted. Who took their time to do this?
Captain America looked up, and patted the spot on the bed beside him. You hesitantly sat, waiting for him to chew you out, for him to get angry, to yell at you, like Nat and the others had always done before.
There was one person. Bucky.
He knew. But Bucky was out doing something, even he had stopped checking up on you, and now you had no one.
He shifted, lifting his arm and you flinched, cringing slightly.
Seeing your behavior put him in pain. The others hadn't dealt with this the right way. His eyes softened and he lifted up your chin with gentle fingers, making your eyes meet his.
Lost in the trance of those earnest sapphire orbs, you relaxed, and his gaze held your e/c one.
He didn't pry, didn't say anything. But you knew he was there for you, and that reassured you. Letting out a small sigh, your sore muscles seemed to liquify and you slumped right into the arms of the super soldier, like you always wanted to do. You melted into his warm chest, and felt his hands run through your hair. His warm, kind, gentle embrace stirred out the emotions inside you, it drew them out, crumbled the hard shell you had built, made mainly out of pain and exhaustion, that was keeping them out.
Your chest started to heave and your lips were shaky, and out of nowhere the torrent of emotions and tears came crashing down in a wave so hard you would've gotten swept away, stranded without your faithful soldier there to hold you.
He was your anchor, and you would be lost without him.
And as he held your frail, trembling body, murmuring sweet nothings into your ear, you had no doubt about that.
(Time skip brought to you by Clint sticking refrigerator magnets on Bucky's arm)
At last your storm of tears subsided, and your companion was still there, holding you.
Your eyes were squeezed shut and your chest heaving.
"Shhhh." Steve murmured. "You're okay."
Eyes sticky with tears, you reluctantly opened them to your dimly lit room. Steve wiped your face clean with a tissue, and studied your face.
"Why-" you croaked out absolutely unattractively, cringing at the sound of your voice. Steve had a bottle of water on the nightstand, which he promptly handed to you.
You only noticed how thirsty you were once you started drinking.
"Why are you helping me?"
Steve's heart hurt to see you feel like that, like you were completely undeserving of anything good in the world. You had been torturing yourself recently, and he just wanted it to stop.
"I don't want you to hurt yourself,
Y/N. You've been so harsh on yourself, and you don't deserve that."
"But I do." You glanced down at your body bitterly. "I do. It was my fault this happened to me."
He stroked your hair. "No, doll, no it's not. You were so brave out there, I doubt some of us would be alright without you doing that."
You couldn't help it, you broke down again. "I-I don't deserve how nicely you're treating me now, th-they yelled at me and I didn't do anything right. No one needed my help. I should've been stronger, a-and actually useful."
Once again, you became a hiccuping, sobbing mess. Weeks of feeling numb after awakening from your coma, the emotions that had been buried for all this time came surging up in erratic spouts.
Your head pounded, and every part of you ached. It was all you could do, just lie there in the arms of Steeb and cry.
After you had calmed down (again), Steve returned to tending to you. "You are useful, Y/N. The others were just upset you were hurt, and they went overboard, that's all. Everyone's just glad to have you back."
"I-it doesn't s-seem like it. I haven't seen m-most of them in s-so long..."
He seemed to think for a moment. "Oh. Right. I forgot about that thing we were working on. No one came to visit you?"
You shook your head. "Y-you were the only one."
Sighing in disappointment, he wrapped his arms around you tighter. "They shouldn't have done that. I swear, Y/N/N, they're just so distracted. Tony is starting to live off of coffee and stress again."
You chuckled softly. "He's working his ass off again, huh?"
"Language." Cap corrected automatically. Then he blinked a few times, like he'd done that without thinking.
"I was-" you began shyly, and you stared down at the blankets. "I was beginning to think everyone had given up on me." You mumbled. "It's kind of stupid, I know I took it too seriously." You rushed on, before he could interject. (iF i MiGhT iNtErGeCt)
"But I wouldn't be surprised if they did because I guess I had sort of given up on myself too..."
"No, no. No one had given up on you. No one has. In fact, they're working on the projects for you."
You looked like a child, stunned and with your eyes wide.
"For me?"
He nodded, playing with a strand of your damp h/c locks.
"Bruce is developing medicine or something. Tony is making you your very own suit, since he feels you deserve one. Nat is helping him make special exercise equipment, to rebuild the strength in your body. And Bucky..."
He trailed off, and you knew someone was wrong. "What's wrong with Bucky?"
You grabbed his arm, and winced.
"Hey. It's okay. " He gently, softly rubbed your wounded, sore arms.
"Bucky went to Wakanda to confer and... he needed some time. He needed space. He didn't want to see you in that state you were, and... the Wakandans might be able to help."
Tears stung your eyes once again.
"So I drove him away?" Your voice cracked softly. Bucky Barnes had been your closest friend. "With that stupid sacrifice no one needed, just creating a burden, a deadweight. No one needed my help. I guess I just wanted to feel significant again, but I just made it worse, didn't I?"
Steve hated this. The super soldier hated the way someone being insensitive and distracted could hurt someone so badly. They should've been more careful, especially with you in your fragile state.
It was messed up, thinking you were doing something good for someone, and being blind to the way they suffered and felt unwanted because of your neglect. He hated seeing you in pain.
"I-I scared him away, didn't I? Just like I did with everyone el-"
Steve cut off your rambles of self loathing, sitting up, and placing a gentle hand on your cheek. He rubbed circles with his thumb, drawing closer, gazing into your eyes.
All of this close physical contact was making you flustered, like the awkward being you were. Also the fact that a vErY aCtTrAcTiVe super soldier (whom you'd always loved liked) was gazing into your e/c orbs, those lovely crystal blue eyes filled with concern. You'd never gotten so intimate with anyone, and you didn't think anyone wanted to.
Until he pressed his soft lips to yours, in a gentle, affectionate, calm kiss.
But nothing about your thoughts was calm. They were more like GAH GAH GAH WHAT TO DO HOLY FUCK HES GOOD SHIIITTTT FUCCKKKK HIS SKIN IS SOFT AAAAAAAGGGGGHHHH W H A T T H E F U C K HHHHHHHHHHHHHH SKSSKSKSKSKSKSK HES HOT WAIT WHAT AAAAAHHGGGGG
G H GH GH HHHH GGGGG
But on the outside, you were completely frozen. He pulled back, unsure until you remembered to move again and made this weird squeal-whimper sound that you instantly wished you could take back but he thought was absolutely adorable, and he smiled fondly.
"You're not a burden, doll. You keep us going, and you have no idea how significant you are to everyone, to me. It's true, we would be lost without you. I would be so lost."
You started to shake your head, but he stopped you, continuing.
"Remember how amazing you were with Bucky? He was a shell of himself, and tried to kill everyone multiple times. But you're so patient, and he softened up right away. You helped heal him, and it's only fair that we do the same for you."
Cheeks warm, you buried your face in his chest once again. "T-Thank you." You couldn't believe anyone would speak so highly of you, much less him. The two of you stayed like that for a while, until his muffled voice broke the silence.
"I'm sorry, darling."
You raised your head, confused.
"For how we neglected you. We should've payed more attention, given you the care you deserved. Don't say you don't deserve better. Because you do. So much better."
Shaking your head, your cheeks reddened.
"You're being too good to me. "
"No. I'm not being good enough. You deserve the best, Y/N/N. You don't know how much you mean to us. To me."
He paused, looking tenderly into your eyes, hesitation showing, like he was reluctant to say something.
"What is it?" You prompted quietly.
"I love you."
Taken by surprise, your eyes widened.
"I-I'm sorry that was so sudden and if I made you feel uncomfortable I'm sorry I just... I really do. "
He stammered, flustered and waiting for your response.
You smiled, glad some things were good and normal. Innocent, cute sweet Steeb was back.
Your response was connecting your lips again.
"I love you too."
You murmured between kisses, as he threaded his fingers through your soft strands of hair.
"So much."
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Legs entwined, you laid in each other's arms, peacefully enjoying the company.
Your NeW bOyFrIeNd had alerted the others that you were out of that state and doing better, but told them to leave you two alone and had to shoo Clint out of the vents of your room a few times.
You stretched in a yawn, and Steve watched you lovingly, a smile playing on his lips.
"Wanna go to sleep now?"
Nodding, you started spreading out the blankets until the protective soldier stopped you and did it himself. He thought he saw something flicker in your eyes and your face fall a little bit, and he sat in front of you and soothingly brushed a finger across your cheek.
"What's wrong, doll?"
"Nothing. I'm fine."
He shook his head.
You sighed and reluctantly told him.
"I guess I don't like people doing everything for me. It makes me feel weak and useless, like I can't even take care of myself. I'm not getting any stronger."
He pecked your nose and you giggled softly.
"You're not weak or useless, everyone needs help sometimes. No one is invincible or strong forever. Right now, you need help, and that's fine. Asking for help doesn't make you weak. It makes you braver and stronger. And maybe you can't tell, but you are getting stronger every day."
He loved cheering you up. Seeing the pretty rosy color bloom in your cheeks and the sparkling in your eyes made him happy too.
"Just don't get stronger too fast," he added.
"Because then I won't get to care far you anymore, and I like taking care for you." He pouted like a whiny, disappointed toddler, which made you laugh. He loved your laugh.
"You're cute."
He pouted again. "No, I'm a scary super soldier!"
You poked his nose.
"You're still cute. "
"You're cuter!"
"Nope."
"Yeah!"
The two of you made a truce, declaring both of you the same amount of cute before heading off to sleep.
Snuggled against his chest, your eyelids drooped as Steve gently traced patterns on your back.
The of you slipped into a peaceful, pleasant slumber, the sound of each other's breathing and warmth lulling both of you to sleep.
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This was a whole lot longer than I expected holy shit
Any whoo Hey guys it's 12:53 AM right now O_O (When I finished writing this)
Well I couldn't sleep and was sweating like crazy. And school started tomorrow, well, today, actually, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
By the time I get to publish this it won't be as unholy of an hour in the morning. Well, no one reads these, but thank you, I love y'all. Bai
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