Chapter Text
Dating is just as complicated in the twenty-first century as it had been in the last one.
If anything, it is even more complicated because while Steve may have been confused and cautious about the rules and norms before, at least he had known what they were. Now the world has had seventy years of cultural shifts and changing social norms, and the prospect of trying to figure out how to date in the middle of that feels nearly impossible.
Not that he really wants to date though. That hasn’t changed. Out of everything, going into the ice hadn't changed that.
It had changed pretty much everything else though.
It is difficult, getting used to everyone he knows being dead, and figuring out new technology, and sifting through the piles and piles of files and paperwork that SHIELD gives him to get him up to speed. He has missed a lot of history and—unlike the average citizen who may not know all the details of one historical movement or the other—he doesn’t have even the barest of background knowledge to fall back on. He has to learn it all from scratch.
He manages it though, for the most part. He reads his files, and he works for SHIELD, and he manages to survive an alien invasion…and he reads his files.
He gets to the 60s in his files, and that helps him understand more about where this new century is coming from. (He also gets to the conservative backlash a few decades later, and that helps him understand even more.)
Things are similar and different now than they used to be in the 40s. In some areas, sex is less stigmatized, and conversations about discrimination and marginalisation in all areas are cropping up. It isn’t new problems, but with the internet and the vast dissemination of ideas it is easy to feel like things are changing much faster than they used to.
It becomes clear to him that a lot of people—for better or for worse— expect him to be opposed to a lot of these changes, simply because of where, and when he is from. To be honest, that baffles him. He has never liked bullies, and he had just woken up from fighting a war sparked by intolerance, hatred, racism, bigotry, and violence. He is not very inclined to let any of that sit undisturbed in the world today— no matter who it might be aimed at.
That isn’t to say that some things don’t take some getting used to, and he doesn’t always understand all the terminology or changes in thinking that are mainstream now… But he is fully prepared to do what he needs to do in order to learn and understand and support the progress that has been made in his absence.
That doesn’t exactly make dating any easier though.
While in some areas, sex seems to be less stigmatised (sometimes at least), he can’t help noting that things also seem to be hypersexualised now. He tries not to let it get to him, because he fears coming off as uptight or prudish about it, but some of it does make him uncomfortable.
It isn’t that he is against other people exploring that kind of thing, but the sheer prevalence of it everywhere feels almost overwhelming. If there was a pressure back in the forties to find someone and get married, then now it feels like there is a pressure to find someone and sleep with them.
Of course, he knows that not everyone believes that—and the growing conversations about consent and safe sex don’t seem all that bad to him—but… in a way, it feels like the pressure for sex, on guys especially… hasn’t changed that much.
He can remember when Lorraine had kissed him. She had probably fully expected him to enjoy it and reciprocate, because that was expected of guys. He hadn't known what to do at the time, because rejecting her had felt he was admitting something he didn’t want to.
Nowadays there is more talk about consent and being able to reject unwanted attention, but it still feels like there is an expectation that, eventually, everyone will want that sort of thing. And, losing one’s virginity seems to take on a new importance.
The idea had been there before, but now suddenly the perception (in some society at least) that someone who hasn’t had sex is some kind of innocent, young thing—or on the other hand—a pitiable loner, seems all the more prevalent.
That frustrates him. Why is having sex all that important to people? Why is there this idea that not doing so makes someone young, or naïve, or immature? Of all the things in the world, he would not say he is ‘innocent’, not after what he had fought through… But in the media everywhere, he sees this stigma against the ‘aging virgin’.
Of course, there is still a stigma against sex too… But it feels to him like society isn’t happy with either side of the coin.
It doesn’t help that Captain America has become a sort of symbol now. People may have begun to know him back in the war, but now everyone knows him, and they all have plenty of pre-conceived notions about him and his sexual life.
He isn’t against sex. Not exactly. But he doesn’t really feel inclined to just go do it for the sake of doing it either. He isn’t sure how that will come across to any of his potential partners. He already knows that if he were to ever want to have sex with someone, then it would not be right away, and with the way media portrays dating nowadays…
He knows that that will have to be a conversation he would need to have almost immediately with his date, and with the way people view Captain America…and with the way people look at him through the lens of seventy years of progress looking back on the forties…
He can see the headlines now. CAPTAIN AMERICA UPHOLDS TRADITIONAL VALUES, or maybe YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHICH OF THESE CELEBRITIES IS STILL A VIRGIN; NUMBER SIX WILL SURPRISE YOU.
That is part of why he doesn’t feel like he can talk to anyone about this. After the Battle of New York, SHIELD puts him on a STRIKE team, and it is common for him to hear the same type of talk among them as he would when working back in the forties. It makes him just as uncomfortable, and it feels just as foreign as it had used to, but he doesn’t know how to say that.
He is pretty sure that if he mentioned any of this to anyone, they would just see it as him being ‘old-fashioned’ or backward. But that isn’t it. He has always been this way and nothing, not the serum, not the ice, not even Peggy had changed that.
Peggy is another thing that is different in the twenty-first century.
He wakes up and she is already an old woman. He had died and she had lived a life after him, and he is happy about that. A part of him is sad by the loss of what could have been—and he finds that history has turned their romance into something much more than it had ever been—but he is glad that Peggy had been able to find happiness without him.
“You lived a good life,” he tells Peggy when he visits her, and she smiles at him as she looks over at the picture of her children by her bedside.
“Let me tell you about them,” she says, and he has heard these stories before, but nothing in the world could keep him from settling down and listening again.
Strangely enough—or maybe not—the unfulfilled promise between him and Peggy isn’t the hardest part about this new life of his. There is a sadness there, but it is mixed in with, and overwhelmed by his grief over everything else. On top of it all, he is still grieving Bucky, who had died only a short while ago for him. The bond between him and Peggy may have been new and hopeful, but the one between him and Bucky had been there much longer, and the pain of losing it aches continually.
In a way, the change between him and Peggy feels a lot like what had happened between him and Elizabeth, years ago. He would have been happy, if something had grown between them, and something had been growing between them, but there is no chance of that now, and he can feel his brain gently and quietly putting those feelings in a box on a shelf in his head. He might riffle through it occasionally, and he may keep his compass stored carefully away somewhere safe, where it won’t get damaged, but he is not grieving the loss in the same way he thinks some people expect him too.
Society’s perception of him and Peggy acts as a sort of useful barrier for a while though. For the first little while after the ice, it is as though everyone is giving him space to grieve and process that loss. He is mostly too overwhelmed by everything to really worry about other women, but for the most part, they leave him alone.
And then… whatever universal mourning period allotted to him seems to lapse, because slowly but surely, he finds himself becoming the object of people’s attention again. Generally, it isn’t as bad as it had been with Lorraine, but he still isn’t used to being viewed like that, and he also finds it difficult to really believe that the people are connecting to him, and not some idea of him that they have in their heads.
If it had been difficult to connect to people before, it is even harder now. The legend of Captain America sits like a dividing wall between him and other people. He has no way of knowing whether he is being approached simply because of his looks, his status, his history, or himself. And that…that makes it difficult for him to even think about pursuing things further with anyone (never mind the looming Conversation about relationship expectations that he knows will need to happen should he ever try to actually date someone.)
It doesn’t really bother him being single though. Sure, the idea of having someone in his life seems nice, but he also isn’t desperate for it. Singleness seems to be a controversial issue nowadays, but he tries not to let it bother him. If he finds someone that he actually wants to date and spend time with, then he will be open to that. For now…he mostly just focuses on coping with modern life.
oOo
Not everyone seems inclined to let him live that way though. About a year into waking up and working with SHIELD, Natasha seems to decide that the time is well past for him to get a date. “If you’re nervous about it, I can help you,” she says on their way back from a mission. “I know things are probably different now, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still have fun.”
To be honest, he thinks Natasha’s efforts are probably her way to try to connect with him and help him the best way she knows how, but he isn’t really interested. He already knows a bit about the culture of dating nowadays, and while he knows people still go about it the ‘old-fashioned way’, there is also a culture of online dating, and blind dates, and one-night stands.
None of those things really seem pleasant to him, and he also knows that if he were to go on a date, there is a very good chance that he might know immediately that he doesn’t want to go on any more with the person. He imagines gaining a cold reputation by turning down second dates with people he doesn’t click with over and over probably isn’t a good idea.
So he declines Natasha’s offer. “Thanks,” he says, tugging off his gloves. “But I have plenty of fun on my own.”
Natasha doesn’t get a chance to reply to that, because behind her, Rumlow scoffs and manages to turn the phrase into an innuendo with a single sound. That is yet another thing that Steve doesn’t have a lot of mental practice doing, and he hates the fact that his blush is probably seen as him just being naïve and easily flustered, rather than embarrassed and annoyed because everyone—in the forties and now—seems to enjoy doing that way more than he does.
He turns away after that, and Natasha lets the subject drop for the time being.
Not forever though.
She doesn’t push it super far—he never finds out that she had organised a date for him, or written any love notes on his behalf or anything—but every few missions now, she will mention someone or another that she thinks would be compatible with him.
For the most part, he doesn’t really want to date SHIELD agents, because he thinks that they probably see too much of Captain America in him, and getting to know civilians is almost as hard as getting to know Peggy during the war, so that is off the table too.
Natasha doesn’t give up, despite her growing list of failures, but she does ask him once if the ‘girl’ part of the equation is the problem. He probably shouldn’t be surprised by her question, but… he doesn’t think that is it either.
“I think it’s just me,” he tells her, and he has to press his lips against the sudden onslaught of words about how it had always been him. “I’m not against dating,” he says instead, because he doesn’t want her to think that. “I just haven’t found the right partner yet.”
Natasha tilts her head at him, and she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “We’ll find the right one, eventually,” she says after a moment, and he lets out a breathy laugh, shaking his head.
To be honest, he isn’t sure about that, but he finds he isn’t too worried about it.
oOo
Natasha’s question about his dating preferences does linger in his head though, and he finds himself thinking it over again a few weeks later on his day off. He is downtown, browsing through the collection of one of the big-chain book stores. He is mostly looking to find some more history books for himself, or maybe a few ‘classic’ fiction books that he had missed, but he finds his eye catching on a colourful display by the window.
It is June now, and the table is draped with rainbow streamers and he realises suddenly that he knows what this is. He had learned about Pride month from SHIELD’s files, but this is his first time really experiencing it since waking up. He drifts towards the table, and his eyes flick over the display.
There are a few autobiographies, as well as some fictional stories set out, although the historical ones interest him most, since he had only gotten a brief overview from SHIELD about the growth of all this in the past seventy years.
He is reaching for one about Marsha P. Johnson, when his eye catches on a book sitting near the back of the table, the white cover catching the light of the window as he looks over. The Asexual Umbrella, it reads in bold black letters, a purple umbrella with a grey handle sitting open and embossed on the front.
He blinks at it, because he doesn’t know that word, and he had been trying his best to stay informed on these sorts of things. He reaches for it, mostly out of the desire not to be left out of the loop, and he flips it over to read the back.
It takes him a second to find the summary among the various reviews but eventually he manages to scan the blurb. What is the Asexual Umbrella? it starts. The Asexual Umbrella is a term that encompasses asexuality and the rest of its spectrum, be it demisexuality, or grey-sexuality. Sexual attraction is common for many people, but people on this spectrum experience little to no sexual attraction to anyone.
In a world that seems to rotate around sexual and romantic relationships, feeling otherwise can sometimes seem alienating. However, while these feelings can at times seem overwhelming, author Jean Price reassures her readers that asexuality is valid and an innate part of who they are.
In each chapter, readers will find a comprehensive guide to asexual and aromantic orientations as well as the lived experiences and stories from those on the asexual and aromantic spectrum as they navigate life, love, sex, and anything else that comes their way.
His mouth feels dry as he finishes reading, and he forgets all about the shop behind him as he flips the book back over, staring at the cover again. He has never heard of any of this before, and some of the words are still foreign to him, but some of what it had said…
People on this spectrum experience little to no sexual attraction to anyone.
Is that…is feeling that way…something other people also feel?
His hands shake slightly as he opens the book, and he finds himself reading greedily, his eyes skimming over the table of contents, before flipping to the introduction. The first part of the books starts off mostly with the author’s intentions and writing process and he finds himself sucked in by every word.
The term asexual umbrella (or asexual spectrum), it says, encompasses all of the identities related to asexuality, including asexual, grey-asexual, and demisexual, and in this book I will often use ace, or asexuality to refer to the entire spectrum. Asexuality and aromantism are broad and varied, and often underrepresented, which is part of why I wanted to write this book.
Asexuality and aromantism are important, and the living stories in these pages help bring it all to life. Whether you are asexual, questioning, hoping to learn more, or simply curious, this book is for you.
He isn’t exactly sure how long he stands there reading the book. Patrons move around him in the bookstore, and a few people probably wonder at him, but he finds his entire being focused down on the book in his hands.
The first chapter is about asexuality itself, and as he reads it—first the basic definitions and history, and then the stories and experiences of community members—he can’t stop the growing feeling that this is him. This is all part of him too, and he had had no idea that any of this existed at all.
The overall asexual experience is varied. Some people he finds, do have sex. Some don’t at all, and the same thing goes for romantic relationships and masturbation. It feels almost mind-blowing as he reads some of the excerpts from people talking about their asexuality. So much of it feels similar to how he feels that it is almost hard to comprehend.
Even as he reads though, asexuality doesn’t quite seem to fit all the way. He probably would have been content with it though, if he hadn't flipped to the next chapter, this time about demisexuality.
Demisexuality is a sexual orientation in which someone feels sexual attraction only to someone after they have developed an emotional bond, it reads. Most demisexuals feel sexual attraction rarely compared to the general population, and some have little to no interest in sexual activity.
He blinks, and he rereads the definition, and something about it…seems to click. His knees feel weak and his throat is dry when he swallows, his mind reeling. This…this sounds a lot like what he feels.
His eyes skip over to the demisexual flag on the next page, trying to take in the idea that this could represent him. The demisexual flag is similar to the asexual flag, but instead of simple lines of colour, it has a large black triangle on the left side, with a large band of white, a smaller band of purple, and another larger band of grey feeding out from it.
He stares at it for a moment longer before moving on to some of the interview sections of the chapter. As he reads, he can’t help feeling more and more like this orientation is the one that fits him.
I didn’t know about demisexuality for a long time, Chloe, a twenty-four-year-old says. For most of my life I just assumed everyone felt the same way that I did, and it was so weird for me to learn that people didn’t feel that way.
I remember once, I was at a sleepover with my friends, and we were playing one of those Describe-your-future-spouse games, and I could not understand how anyone could know what they wanted their spouse to look like before they had even met them. I don’t really have a ‘type’, like most people seem to.
The next one is from another girl, a twenty-one-year-old. I noticed it because I seemed to get way fewer crushes than the rest of the world, she says. I couldn’t understand why everyone made such a big deal about them. After a while I thought that maybe, I just couldn’t feel those things – that I was emotionally broken or something. I used to worry that I couldn’t fall in love, and I would try to reassure myself with the few crushes I had had. Now that I know about demisexuality, things make a lot of sense and I feel a lot better.
My dad used to try to talk to me about girls all the time, Marc says. I knew I didn’t like girls, so at first, I thought that was all this was. I had people tell me I was just a late-bloomer, and that eventually I would feel the same things as everyone else… It was confusing to me sometimes because sometimes I would think I actually did finally get what people were saying, but often it would be towards close friends I had been around for a long time.
I was married, before I ever knew about any of this, says another woman, this time in her late forties, and he suddenly feels relieved that there are older people as well who have experienced this. There weren’t any resources about this when I was young. Sometimes I would feel uncomfortable in situations, but I thought that maybe everyone felt that way at first. When I was dating, it took me a while to feel the attraction that people seemed to expect, and I used to worry I was leading people on without meaning to.
The stories go on like that, and in the next chapter about grey-sexuality, he finds similar experiences. Grey-sexuality is defined in the book as people who experience limited sexual attraction, and it is another orientation that fits with asexuality in some ways, but not all of them. The experiences of ‘Grey-A’s’ seems to fall on a spectrum as well and he finds that demisexuality still feels like the best fit for him.
After that the book goes into aromantic orientations and he decides that he is probably demiromantic as well. It feels a little strange just deciding these things for himself, since he had never really thought about it before, but it makes so much sense reading it that he can’t help the warm glow that fills his chest at the same time.
He wishes he had known about this before. He wishes he had had the words for this before. He hadn’t realised how lonely it had been wondering and worrying about this until he had learned that other people feel this way too.
Asexual representation is still limited, the book states at its conclusion. And resources can be hard to find, especially since much of it is online. As some of the people in here have shared, there are still difficulties faced by asexuals that can feel overwhelming or painful. Whether it is a doctor who is unaware of asexuality, and thinks it a medical symptom—or if it is simply the feeling of not being ‘ace enough’ to fit in with the ace community, or the wider LGBTQ community as a whole—asexuals can feel alone in a world they can’t seem to mesh with.
I hope through these pages and through the varied and vibrant lives of individuals from all along the asexual spectrum that it becomes clear that no matter where someone sits under the umbrella, there is a place, and a community here for them.
He is speechless as he finishes reading. He doesn’t know how long he has been standing in front of the display, but his neck and shoulders are sore, and his feet hurt. He couldn’t care less about that though. His mind is still set firmly on the book and the things that he had just learned.
He had known none of this. He had had absolutely no idea, but now that he does, things seem to make so much sense. It is a relief to read this, and he feels almost giddy knowing that there is a whole community of people who feel the same way he does. People who understand exactly how he feels, and his own confusion, and his own difficulty.
It is such a sharp, new feeling that he almost doesn’t know what to do with it. He pulls the book close to his chest though, and he turns to head towards the cash register. He thinks he will be rereading this book many times in the coming days.
oOo
Now that he knows about asexuality, he searches it up online. There he finds even more sources, and stories, and forums, and he spends a lot of his free time scrolling through the pages and marveling at all the people who feel similarly to him.
It is comforting just knowing the word and having a name for how he feels and for the next few days, he feels like he is walking on air.
The book and the online forums had talked about what is called ‘coming out’, or telling other people about your sexual orientation. He spends a lot of time thinking about that too. There are pros and cons to coming out, and there are stories—good and bad—about doing it.
For the most part, he doesn’t really feel like he has anyone he is close enough to for him to want to go through the emotional labour of ‘coming out’. (He wishes though, that he had known this word before now. He thinks back to some of what Bucky had said before, and he can’t help thinking that his friend would have understood if he had tried to tell him this.)
He does tell one person though. The next time he visits Peggy, she notices right away that something is different about him. “You’re happy,” she says, her eyes bright as she looks him over and reaches for his hand. “What is it?”
He can’t help smiling at her, and he squeezes her hand. His newfound knowledge rises up in his mind, and before he knows it, he finds himself telling her about it. “I learned something,” he says. “Something amazing.”
Peggy doesn’t know what demisexuality is right away, but he finds that he doesn’t mind explaining it to her, because she seems willing to listen and understand, and he wants to share. “I wish I had known about this back then,” he tells her, meeting her gaze. “I would have been able to better explain to you how I was feeling. Things make a lot of sense now.”
Peggy smiles softly at him, her eyes as warm as always. “I’m happy for you,” she says quietly, the lines of her face creasing with her smile. “I’m glad you found this.”
Besides Peggy, there is really only one other person that he can really see himself talking to about what he had learned, and that one makes him a little more apprehensive than before. Intellectually, he can’t see Natasha taking issue with his asexuality…
But that doesn’t mean he feels at ease talking to her about it. With Peggy it had been easier, because he hadn't felt that she would have any preconceived notions of asexuality, and she doesn’t really have any expectations on him either.
With other people though, it is different.
It is unfortunate, but he is aware of a portion of the population that has a problem with asexuality and demisexuality—people even in the ace or LGBTQ community. The book and some of the online forums had mentioned worries and confrontations about ‘not being ace enough’, and some posts he had read had discussed frustration with some LGBTQ spaces being less welcoming to aro ace people.
That makes him nervous. It isn’t that he thinks that Natasha won’t accept who he is. But… well, the possibility is there. And there is also a possibility that Natasha won’t even know what demisexuality is, or that she won’t believe it is real, or important, or different from just ‘being normal’.
He doesn’t want to deal with that, and he doesn’t want to have to defend himself either.
He doesn’t have to tell anyone though. That is his choice, and the online forums had been clear that if he didn’t feel safe or comfortable doing it, then he didn’t have to.
So… he decides to leave it for now. Right now, it is enough to have the word for himself, and to be able to share it with Peggy. And now that he knows his own feelings, it gets a little easier to handle working on the STRIKE team and everything that entails.
He won’t say he isn’t tempted to burst out with it sometimes though, when Natasha suggests another blind date for him to go on, or someone to ask out. He understands better now why that doesn’t really appeal to him, but he doesn't really know how to tell Natasha that. It isn’t unbearable, but it is something that he probably wouldn’t mind stopping.
But…he would have to tell her about him to really stop it, and there is always the possibility that that won’t stop it, or that other people will learn about it and decide that he just needs to find the right person in order to ‘get over it’.
He doesn’t think he can handle that. So he leaves things the way they are for now.
It isn’t that hard to fend off Natasha actually, and he thinks that that is probably a sign that she wouldn’t react too badly to his orientation.
“What about that nurse across the hall?” she calls to him after parachuting down to help him infiltrate the Lumerian Star. “She seems nice.”
“Secure the engines first,” he deflects easily. “Then find me a date.”
“I’m multitasking,” she shoots back, and it is more teasing than anything else, reminding him a bit of Bucky, back before the war. He smiles a little at that, and moves to search the ship for the head pirate that had taken it.
Retaking the ship from pirates could have gone better, but his work with SHIELD is suddenly about to get a whole lot more complicated, and he doesn’t have much time to think about what to do about Natasha.
SHIELD isn’t what it was supposed to be. He isn’t exactly sure what it is yet, but Fury had been killed and SHIELD had tried to apprehend him in an elevator, forcing him to go on the run, in order to try to figure out what is going on.
He is a little high-strung when he finds Natasha with the USB stick that Fury had left him before he had been killed, and he doesn’t even know at first whether or not he can trust her. Fury had warned him not to trust anyone, and SHIELD had just open fired on him half-an-hour earlier, so he isn’t feeling very generous with trust at the moment.
Natasha seems to realise that, her eyes flicking rapidly over his angry expression as he leans over her. “I know who killed Fury,” she says quickly, opening up and offering him an olive branch. He pulls back a little at that, and she tells him about a fifty-year-old ghost story called the Winter Soldier.
She shows him a scar on her abdomen, and he decides to take a chance.
“Let’s see what this ghost wants,” he says.
oOo
Natasha takes them to an electronics store in the mall so that they can try to read the USB Fury had left them. Of course, SHIELD is able to trace them the moment they plug it in, and they have about nine minutes before the calvary comes and hunts them down.
Natasha isn’t able to read the file, but she is able to trace where it had come from, and a map pops up to show a location in New Jersey. With that information, they are able to duck out of the store in time to miss the STRIKE team, but not before the mall gets infiltrated.
“First rule of going on the run,” Natasha tells him as they walk purposely through the mall, his eyes scanning the crowd for hostiles. “Walk, don’t run.”
The advice is sound, but it does leave them trapped on an escalator heading down, while Rumlow stands on the one beside them, heading up. He is busy trying to calculate escape plans should they get spotted and this all go pear-shaped, when Natasha spins around and looks up at him, her eyes determined.
“Kiss me,” she states bluntly, and he stares at her.
“What?” he manages, thrown off by the abrupt order, and Natasha doesn’t waste any time as she cuts to the chase.
“Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable,” she says, and he can see where she is coming from, but–
“Yes, they do,” he tries to say pointedly, sweat prickling uncomfortably over his shoulders as Natasha stares up at him and Rumlow gets closer on the opposite escalator. Evidently, they don’t have time for his hesitation, because Natasha grabs him and leans in, her face ducking under his baseball cap as she puts her hand on the back of his neck and presses her lips to his.
His stomach clenches uneasily, but he doesn’t pull back, because he knows what she is doing, and he knows why. It doesn’t make it pleasant, but it is at least different from Lorraine this time. Natasha does nothing but press her lips against his. She doesn’t try to deepen it or pull him in any more than she already has, which helps. He doesn’t move either, remaining frozen as the escalator continues downward.
Natasha pulls away as Rumlow passes them, and she spins to walk down the steps of the escalator to the first floor.
“You still uncomfortable?” she calls, and he supresses a sigh.
“It's not exactly the word I would use,” is all he says, trying to put the moment behind him and forget the far too familiar feel of unwanted lips on his mouth so that he can focus back on the mission in front of them.
It is a two-hour car ride to New Jersey though, and he probably should have expected Natasha to bring it up again. She sits next to him in the passenger seat, and he can feel her watching him as she pulls her feet off the dashboard.
“Alright, I have a question for you,” she starts, her eyes flicking over him as he drives. “One, which you do not have to answer,” she continues, before her voice takes on a more commentary tone. “I feel like if you don't answer it though, you're kind of answering it, you know?
He resists the urge to roll his eyes and throws her a quick glance to cut her off. “What?”
Natasha’s head bobs with the divots in the road, and her eyes remain fixed on him, something curious in her gaze. “Was that your first kiss since 1945?”
This time he really does sigh. He can’t be sure where this conversation is going, but he has a guess, and he feels tired just thinking of it. For a moment, the urge to finally tell Natasha about his orientation rises up in his throat, but he swallows it back, the habit of deflecting winning over instead. “That bad, huh?
Natasha’s voice is playful and defensive all in one. “I didn't say that.”
He huffs out a breath and rolls his shoulders as he flicks his eyes over the road and then over to her. “Well, it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying.”
Natasha shakes her head, her posture still as relaxed as ever as she looks at him. “No, I didn't,” she maintains, and he can feel her gaze on him as he keeps his eyes on the road. “I just wondered how much practice you've had.”
His mind flashes back over his very short experience with kissing, and his stomach clenches uncomfortably with something close to nausea. “You don't need practice,” he says, and his argument would probably have some validity – if he had experience in general. But he hasn’t, not really, and—
Natasha scoffs lightly, shaking her head in disbelief, her tone still mostly curious, with a pinch of teasing. “Everybody needs practice.”
He swallows, and he can feel the lie he needs rise up in his throat. It was not my first kiss since 1945. It is easy to say. Simple. It wouldn’t even matter if Natasha knew it was a lie. He could say it and she would probably drop the topic. He could say it, it doesn’t matter. He could say it. Words rise up in his throat and he grits his teeth, his stomach flipping as he opens his mouth and—
“I’m demisexual.”
It is all he can do not to choke and swallow his tongue at his admission. The words burst out of him seemingly on their own, and he doesn’t know what to do about it now. He becomes hyperaware of Natasha next to him as he waits for her to react to his words. His hands feel sweaty all of the sudden and he tries to relax his grip on the wheel as he drives. His shoulders are tense though, and the endeavor proves fruitless.
Natasha shifts next to him, and he doesn’t look at her. “Oh,” she says, and the tone is simple and straight forward, not exactly shocked, but not disgusted either. “Thank you for telling me.”
He glances at her in surprise, and she meets his gaze easily. He blinks at her once before pulling his eyes back to the road so that they don’t crash. “Yeah,” he manages, his tongue dry as he works it around in his mouth. “So… I didn’t really have a lot of kisses before 1945 either.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he thinks he sees Natasha’s mouth quirk up and he relaxes a little, readjusting his grip on the steering wheel as he pushes his shoulders back into the seat. Beside him, Natasha shifts in her seat again, and he throws her another glance.
“You…know what demisexuality is?” he clarifies, because from what he has heard, the term isn’t as well known as some of the other orientations.
Natasha nods, something contemplative in her eyes as she looks at him. “I guess that explains why all my date suggestions have been falling through,” she says, and he huffs out a short breath that isn’t quite a laugh.
“Yeah,” he says ruefully, focusing his eyes back on the road. “Blind dates aren’t really my thing.”
He can feel Natasha watching him, and for a moment there is only the sound of the road passing under them as they sit in the car. Finally, Natasha speaks up again. “I’m not going to ask you why you didn’t tell me before,” she says, and she meets his gaze again when he looks at her. “That’s personal for you. But…” she trails off and licks her lips before tucking her hair behind her ear. “I hope you know I would've stopped the suggestions if you’d asked me to.”
Her eyes shift away from his to look out through the windshield, and he nods, letting out a breath. He doesn’t say that he had known that, because that isn’t entirely true. But he doesn’t want Natasha to feel bad about it either. “It…” his hands flex on the steering wheel. “It wasn’t so bad,” he manages, quirking his mouth up at her. “And it mostly kept the STRIKE team off my back so…”
Something seems to ease around Natasha’s eyes when he next looks at her, and she tosses her head as she puts her hands comfortably into the pockets of her hoodie. He flicks his eyes over her and looks back at the road. “I haven’t really told anybody,” he says, even though she had said he didn’t have to explain. “I’ve told Peggy, and now you,” he looks over again. “But that’s it.”
He pulls in a breath and lets it out again. “I guess it was easier that way,” he says, turning to watch the lines on the road zip by. “I wasn’t really sure how people would react, and—” he flicks his eyes to her. “Asexuality doesn’t seem to be talked about as much, you know.” She nods quietly, and he looks back at the road. “It wasn’t even in SHIELD’s files,” he continues. “They covered the basics of the LGBTQ groups for me, but…”
He trails off and shrugs, suppressing a sigh. He sees Natasha nod and cross her legs from where she sits. “So you found asexuality yourself?” she asks, and he nods.
“Yeah,” he says, something easing in his chest as he continues to talk. Now that the initial stress of the admission is over, it feels kind of nice to talk about it with someone, especially since Natasha seems perfectly understanding. “I found a book, actually,” he continues. “I must have look pretty strange standing there and reading the whole thing in the store, but…” he can’t help smiling. “I was pretty enthralled.”
Natasha offers him a smile of her own when he looks at her. “I imagine,” she says quietly, shifting back to get more comfortable. Silence falls between them for a moment, but it isn’t an uncomfortable one, and he lets it sit as Natasha thinks over his words.
After a while, she sits up a little and looks at him. “I guess…I made you more uncomfortable than I wanted to. In the mall.” There is an apology hidden in her words, and he glances over, breathing in before he shrugs.
“Yeah,” he says, looking up ahead again. “But we didn’t have much choice.” He blows out a breath and lets out a dry chuckle as he shakes his head. “To be honest, you orderin’ me to kiss you is more warning than I’ve gotten for most of my other kisses so…”
Natasha raises an eyebrow at that, and before he knows it, he finds the story of Lorraine and Peggy tumbling out of his mouth, his hands clenching a little on the steering wheel as he talks. “I don’t really blame Peggy,” he says. “She was going to wait, but then she thought I was gonna die–” And she hadn't been wrong about that. “–but with Lorraine—”
He can’t help the shiver that runs through him, and he can feel Natasha’s gaze on him from the passenger seat. Her lips press together, and she swallows. “You know…” she says quietly. “You know, nowadays, we would've called that sexual assault.”
His teeth clench a little at that, and he lets out a breath, keeping his gaze focused up ahead. “I could have pushed her away.”
Natasha doesn’t move, and he can feel her eyes on him. “You shouldn’t have had too.”
He pulls in another breath. “No,” he says finally, glancing over at her and flexing his grip on the wheel. “I shouldn’t have had to.” Even if the language of consent had been different back then, even if he hadn't been so obviously uncomfortable with Lorraine, even if it had only been a kiss. He shouldn’t have needed to push her away.
“I don’t think she really meant it that way,” he says after a while. “Everyone just kind of assumed that guys liked kissin’ girls back then.” He shifts his grip on the wheel and lets out a slow breath. “I’m kinda glad people are having more conversations about consent now though. Back then, it felt like if I rejected her, then there would have been a stigma.”
Nowadays, there might still be a lingering stigma, but there are people trying to actively combat it, and he would at least have words for what had happened to him.
“Well,” Natasha says softly, as the turn-off for camp Lehigh comes up ahead of them. “I’m sorry that happened to you.” Before he can say anything, she rolls her shoulders and offers him a small smile. “And I promise I won’t kiss you again unless we’re in mortal danger.”
Her eyes brighten as her words elicit a laugh from him, and he finds his chest feeling rather light as he takes the turn-off.
oOo
After camp Lehigh, and after he had learned about Hydra, and Bucky, and after he had raced against time to stop project Insight—and after he had spent a week or so recovering from his injuries—he and Sam stand next to an empty grave and see Fury off.
He is still achy, and tired, but his thoughts are pulled away from any of that as Natasha steps up to replace Fury, a folder in her hand. He glances over, and he knows what it is. He had asked for it, on the first full day he had been conscious in the hospital, and Natasha had obliged.
“Here,” she says simply, and as he reaches for it, he feels her slip something small and circular into his hand. He glances at her in surprise, and she flashes a smile at him, her eyes bright as she gives him a few parting words, before turning and leaving him with the file and her gift.
He opens his hand, and nestled in his palm, he finds a small metal pin. His eyes widen as the familiar colours of the demisexual flag stare up at him from the face of the button. His mouth opens in surprise, and gratitude swells up in his chest as he darts his head up to where Natasha had come.
“Thank you!” he calls, and Natasha smiles again as she waves.
He can’t explain it, but the pin feels momentously important. He keeps it pinned to his duffle bag while he and Sam tromp back and forth all over the place on Bucky’s trail, and every time he looks at it, he can’t help the flare of pride it ignites in his chest.
One night, when Sam asks him about it, he only hesitates for the barest of seconds before he sits down and tells him what it means.
Epilogue
Months and months later, after he had found Bucky, and after he and Bucky had settled into a mutually acceptable system of balance, and distance, and closeness—whatever Bucky needed as he was trying to piece himself back together again—he is sitting in his new apartment in Brooklyn, freshly returned, and not quite unpacked.
Bucky is with him, but he knows that he will slip out again before the night is over. That doesn’t bother him though. He knows Bucky will be back again soon enough, and he is content to stay here as an anchor while Bucky drifts in and out on the tides of want and need.
Things are already better than they were before. Bucky is less tense and defensive than he had once been, his eyes flicking over the apartment with interest, rather than out of simple threat and defense analysis.
His eyes catch on his duffle bag, thrown on the bed for when Steve has the energy and motivation to unpack it, and he steps over, the fingers of his right hand running over the glossy finish of the striped button.
“What’s this?” he asks, his voice slightly rough as he flicks his gaze to him, his eyes peering curiously up from behind the strands of his hair.
Steve blinks a little in surprise, and then he smiles, settling himself down in the desk chair across from him. “Let me tell you about it,” he says softly.
The End