Never Alone Again |N.R|

Can you trust me?

Sleep never came, and so I spent the entire night staring at the ceiling as I'd expected. The alcohol had worn off eventually, and the pain of my injuries returned full force. I needed to be more careful else they'd never heal, and I'd have to deal with peoples pity much longer. I slowly sat up, the room spinning for a few seconds before it finally stopped. A nice hot shower would wake me up, so that's what I did. I grabbed a change of clothes from my wardrobe and made my way into the bathroom, locking the door behind me. The warm water felt amazing as it ran over my skin, although I hissed when it hit some of the more tender cuts. Once my skin was clean and my hair washed I stepped out of the shower and wrapped myself in a towel, hugging it close to my skin for warmth. Crap, I'd left my change of clothes in the other room. When I opened the bathroom door to quickly grab them Natasha was sitting on my bed. I stopped in my tracks. "What are you doing here?" I questioned her as I grabbed the clothes off of the nearby chair.

"We need to talk, just you and me." I raised an eyebrow, taken aback by her proposal.

"Give me a sec. I need to get dressed and then I'll be back out." I quickly disappeared back inside the bathroom, desperate to hide away for just a minute. I didn't want to have this conversation, but it didn't seem she was going to give me a choice. So once I was dressed and I'd towel dried my hair I left the bathroom, stopping just outside the door and staring at Natasha.

"What did you want to talk about?" I gulped, trying to hide my nerves.

"Everything. Can you come and sit down please?" I hesitated before walking forward, taking a seat on the opposite corner of the bed to her.

"Rue, look at me." I turned my head to meet her eyes.

"What happened to you in Wakanda?" I looked down at my hands now, fiddling with my fingers.

"Nothing really. Shuri removed the tech and mostly erased my trigger words."

"What do you mean mostly?"

"Well, depending on the day they can still affect me. I just have to take a second to calm my mind and it's over just as quick as it started."

"Something else must've happened. Because Rue, you're not the person I used to know."

"She's gone." That was all I offered her, but I expected more questions to come my way.

"What do you mean gone? Why is she gone?"

"Do you want the whole truth?" Natasha nodded and I readied myself for what I was about to say, knowing that it'd hurt her.

"You. You're the reason Natasha." Her eyes widened in shock.

"What do you mean?"

"I waited for you to come. Everyday I waited for you, but you never came. I almost died over there but you wouldn't have known, nobody knows, not even Bucky. So I realised, the one person in the world that I cared for didn't care for me. I had to find other ways to deal with it all, and that's when the drinking started. Is that what you wanted to hear?" Natasha just stared at me in utter disbelief.

"I'm sorry Rue. But I just couldn't face it, face you. I know you didn't mean to hurt me that day but you did, and I was scared."

"Then you could've just said that, or gotten one of the others to tell me. Because at least then I wouldn't have wasted all of that time, all of that heartbreak on waiting for something that was never going to come." We both sat in silence now, neither of us knowing what to say next. Having let my true feelings be known I couldn't help but cry, tears silently falling from my eyes. I turned away to hide them but Natasha noticed immediately.

"Rue I'm so sorry." She reached out and placed a hand on my shoulder lightly. I flinched at the sudden contact, a part of me wanting to pull away whilst the other part wished she'd just pull me into a hug. Instead I just cried harder, unable to hide my feelings any longer. I'd spent every second hiding them since I'd returned and it had become too much. Natasha needed to know just how much she'd hurt me. A few seconds later she moved closer to me before wrapping her arms around my curled up body, with me holding my knees to my chest. The second she pulled me into her chest I placed both of my hands on her arms, making sure that this was real.