Life Goes On
One year later, you were watching your baby girl as she stumbled towards her Uncle Thor. In the past two months, she’d begun to walk and now a whole new world of fear had opened up for you as she seemed to be determined to get herself into as much trouble as possible. You smiled as Thor helped Aspen slowly walk across the room to her toy bin.
As you watched, you thought back on the last year and how everything had changed. As soon as Bitra had cleared you, Sif had started to drag you out to train every morning. Thor was always more than happy to babysit for you while you trained, and you knew Aspen was in good hands.
All the training you’d done with the Avengers felt like nothing compared to the training sessions with Lady Sif. She gave you no pity, and even though you were ‘only a midgardian’ as she liked to say, you were expected to fight like an Asgardian. To be fair, you couldn’t complain about her training methods. Sure, you were constantly bruised, battered and exhausted, but you were in the best shape of your life and your fighting skills had improved considerably.
Your powers had continued to grow, and now you were able to project out the shields. Before, you’d have to keep in contact with them to keep them up. Nowadays, you could fire them out about ten feet from you, and you’d learned to use it to your advantage in a fight. Whenever the fighting got a little too close for comfort, you’d just send a shield flying at them and they’d go soaring back to buy you room.
If it wasn’t for the fact that Bucky wasn’t there, it might have been the best year of your life. The mere thought of Bucky though was enough to make you want to cry. Unfortunately, life goes on and you’d had to accept that. You’d learned to bite back the tears in order to get everything done that you needed to. You could go days without crying now, but every day you felt the knife in your chest as you imagined what raising Aspen would be like if he was there.
Thor had kept going on his weekly check ins to the team, and he told you everyone was fine but they really missed you. You missed the hell out of them too, but you’d made your decision to keep Aspen a secret, and it was one you planned on sticking to. Loki hadn’t been back to Midgard since you’d come to Asgard, but you never questioned it.
Loki shook you from your thoughts as he approached, sitting next to you. You smiled and turned to him. Without a word, you nudged the plate of cake over to him. You’d been celebrating Aspen’s first birthday today and everything was going great.
“You know I’m right” Loki started, and you let out a groan, resting your head on the table.
“Loki, do we have to do this today?” you grumbled.
“Look, I know you’re both Asgardians now, but you know someday she’s going to want to know about her Midgardian roots. Don’t you think it would be better for you to start taking her on vacations there now? What’s going to happen when she’s a rebellious teen and tells you she wants to move there?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Loki. She just turned one. I’ve got twelve years before she’s a teenager. Besides, it’s not like she’d even know if we visited there or not!”
“[Y/N], you know I'm right. It’ll be easier if you start now than when she’s older. If you start now, she’ll never have to wonder and it won’t become some mysterious land that she wants to run away to.”
“For the record, I agree with Loki” Thor explained, still playing with Aspen.
You groaned, “Not you too.”
“Besides, if we go now…. They just put up the tree in downtown. And I know you miss skating at Rockefeller Center. If you agree to go back for just a day, we’ll all go ice skating” Loki promised.
“One day? And you’ll shut up?” you raised your head from the table to look at him.
“One day, and I’ll stop asking you for a year” he stuck out his hand in a silent offering and you rolled your eyes, reaching out to shake his hand.
“We’ll go tomorrow” you sighed, it was already late and you might as well make a full day of it if you were going.
~~~~~~
Bright and early the next morning, you and Aspen met up with Loki and Thor and headed back to Midgard. You’d landed outside of town, and as you loaded onto the train you began to feel antsy. There were so many people here, and if any of the Avengers saw you…
Your thoughts began to race and Thor rested his hand on your shoulder, smiling down at you and Aspen. You took a deep breath and nodded, resting her against her your hip as you looked around. Everything would be fine. It had to be, right?
~~~~~~
It was early afternoon and the day had gone remarkably well. You guys had made it to Rockefeller Center, and you’d finally had the chance to ice skate again. After a while, Aspen had tired of it and you’d decided to take a break as well. You were leaning against the wall of the skating rink watching Thor and Loki skate around while you bounced Aspen absentmindedly. You were too distracted by the two of them to notice the man walking up beside you.
“[Y/N]? Is that really you?” Clint asked, the shock evident in his voice.
“Sorry pal, I think you have the wrong person” you muttered, turning away from him.
Clint snorted in laughter, and grabbed your shoulder in his hand. Before he could speak, though, you’d reared back your arm and attempted to elbow him in the face.
“Woah! Calm down [Y/N]. It’s just me!” he huffed, stepping just outside of your range.
Thor and Loki had spotted the problem, and they raced over to you, stopping just inside the rink. You shot Loki a glare and handed Aspen to Thor without a word. Loki mumbled that they’d give you two some privacy, and they set off skating while you turned to Clint.
“So, you’re gone almost two years and the first thing you do is come back to ice skate, lie to me, and then try to attack me?” he grumbled.
“I’m sorry Clint” you sighed, “Look. I didn’t even want to be here today but Loki made me. I didn’t want to run into -”
“Is it just Bucky you’re worried about running into or were you hoping to avoid all of us” he asked softly.
“You don’t understand Clint. He can’t know” your voice was almost desperate as you turned to look from him, watching Aspen with her uncles.
The silence seemed to last forever before he spoke, “You mean he can’t know about her?”
“Clint, you can’t tell him” you whirled to face him, eyes blown wide “Please. You can’t tell him you saw us”
“Is she why you left?”
You took a deep breath, “Yes. I was going to tell him I was pregnant that night, but he ended things. I didn’t want him deciding to stay with me out of some antiquated sense of responsibility. We’re not his responsibility.”
Clint nodded and stepped closer so his arm brushed yours as you leaned against the wall, looking out over the rink, “So I take it you’re not back for good?”
You shook your head, “Just for the day. We’re headed back tonight after we see the tree.”
“Can I spend the day with you?” his voice was quiet, nervous.
You didn’t say anything for the longest time, but eventually you wrapped him up in a hug. He immediately responded, hugging you back tight. You really had missed your favorite prankster.
After a few moments, you pulled back from him, “Yeah… I think I’d like that”
A brilliant smile lit up his face like a kid on Christmas, but then he bit his lip and stared at you with his puppy dog eyes, “Do you think Nat could come too? She really misses you and she’ll kill me. You know she can keep a secret”
You let out a groan, “Can you get her out here without anyone following her or thinking something’s up? She has to promise not to tell anyone, Clint. Same for you!”
“Consider it done!” he stepped back, pulling out his phone. A few minutes later, he walked back, smiling, “She’s on her way.”
“I swear to you, Clint. If this is a trick or I see Bucky because of you, you’ll wish you’d never been born” you muttered.
Twenty minutes later, you felt arms wrap around you from behind and you froze. Nat released you quickly as you tensed up and you grinned as you turned to face her. Thor and Loki were still out on the ice with Aspen, and it gave the three of you a few minutes to catch up.
About five minutes later, Loki skated up holding a crying Aspen. You whirled and took her from him, and began to calm her down as he skated away again, giving you all space. Nat’s eyes opened in shock and she watched in silence as you soothed your little one.
Nat’s mind raced as she put together all of the pieces. From all of Thor’s slip-ups throughout the year, she’d begun to figure that you had been dating someone else. Thor had often said “they’ and she’d assumed that you had found a new relationship. She’d never considered that you’d had a daughter.
After Aspen had finally quieted, you smiled at Clint and Nat, suddenly nervous, “Guys. This is my daughter, Aspen.”
Nat stood there, shocked silent for the first time as Clint smiled at your baby girl, “Congrats, [Y/N]”
“Is she -” Nat went went silent, eyes studying Aspen.
“Yes. She is, and yesterday was her first birthday” you bounced her around and Aspen giggled.
“Well that explains a lot” she mumbled.
Eventually Loki and Thor rejoined the group, and Thor thoroughly apologized to Clint and Nat for keeping your secret. Luckily, they didn’t seem to hold a grudge against him, knowing he’d only done it for you. You spent the rest of the day catching up, and for a while it felt like you had never left.
When dark fell, you went to watch the tree be lit up with the others and you smiled, your family was almost all there. The day had been perfect, and you grinned. You’d been so caught up in missing Bucky that you’d never realized just how much you missed the others.
It was almost time for you to leave, you had an early morning training session with Sif and Aspen was starting to get grouchy. A souvenir cameraman came by, and spotted your group. When he offered to take a photo of all of you in front of the tree, you’d quickly agreed. The picture was perfect, you in the middle with Aspen and surrounded by your friends and family
You bought two copies of the photo from him, keeping one for yourself and giving the other to Clint after he swore to keep it well hidden. When it was time to leave, there were plenty of tears shed and you promised Clint and Nat that now that they knew about Aspen, they’d be welcome to visit any time.
~~~~~~
Later that night, Clint passed out on the couch in the lounge watching a movie. Steve walked out to find the TV still on at two in the morning and reached to grab the remote from Clint to shut it off. Instead of grabbing the remote though, he instead grabbed a folded up photograph.
There you were, smiling with your family and with a baby girl on your hip. The moment Steve got a good look at Aspen, he knew why you’d left, and now he didn’t know what to do.