Deepest Secret Nobody Knows

When he woke up the next morning, his head felt like it was the size of a blimp. All the commotion in the rain yesterday had caused his body to react as it usually did; he was sick. One moment he felt cold, the next his tired body was slick with sweat. He looked at his alarm clock and saw that it was nearly ten in the morning, he was supposed to help Sam at the VA today; preparing for a fundraiser that was coming up. There was no way he was going to get up and leave his apartment today. When he picked up his phone he noticed that he had already missed a call from Sam this morning; he hit redial without listening to his voicemail.

“You had better be dead for leaving me to paint all of these banners by myself.” Sam said instead of leaving with a simple hello. Steve would have laughed if it hadn’t hurt so much to do so.

“What if I woke up feeling like death?” He croaked out. He told Sam all about everything that had happened to him after he left work yesterday. What he didn’t tell Sam was about the poems and the photographs and how, even though it sounded crazy, he had thought the same man who had saved him in the alley was the one who had been leaving these objects for him to find. They got off the phone a few minutes later with a promise from Sam to bring him some soup after he left the VA.

He climbed out of bed, only wearing his underwear from last night; he may have been sick but at least he had the wherewithal to change into clean clothes. He pulled on his over-sized sweater, its alabaster color making him look even more pale. He stepped out of his bedroom quietly, the morning sun pushed through the last of the rain clouds, causing bright rays of sunlight to shine through his windows. He watched his windows wearily, walking up to them slowly; the lock still unlatched, just as he had left it. He looked all around his apartment, looking for anything that seemed off. Everything in his bookcase sat in the correct spot, the stack of books on his coffee table was untouched. Not one speck of dust looked out of place. It was odd but something about it disappointed Steve. He almost laughed out loud at its absurdity. Being disappointed that some mystery person hadn’t broken into his apartment while he was sleeping. If it was the same man that saved him in the alley, then he couldn’t be that bad of a person, right?

He set about into his tiny kitchen to make some coffee and see if he could put something together for breakfast. He had a long day of rest ahead of him if he were going to get well enough to go into work tomorrow. Once the coffee was brewing, he went over to his record player to put on some music. Sam always laughed at him for keeping vinyl and honestly, he thought it was odd at first as well. The record player and most of the vinyl had been his mother’s; she had gotten them from her parents. They were something that he couldn’t find it within him to part with. Eventually, he started purchasing most of his favorite records on vinyl, which resulted in an electric and impressive collection. He opened the cover and found that there was already a record placed inside. I’ll Be Seeing You by Billie Holiday; one of his grandmother’s that he usually kept inside his record cabinet. He hadn’t looked inside or taken the time to listen to those records in a long time, that kind of music wasn’t really his style. He didn’t have much of an ear for music from the forties. He was about to remove the record from the player when he stopped. All he could hear was the distant tinging of wind chimes outside; he glanced back towards the window. Was this record another message? If the wind and walls could talk, what would they say?

Steve looked back down at the record and curiosity got the better of him. He had heard the song before but had never really thought much of it. He was more familiar with the Frank Sinatra version but once the needle pressed down on the record, the smooth voice of Billie Holiday filled all four walls of his apartment. The speakers caused the needle scratches to be amplified within the small space. Halfway through the song he saw a reflective flash come from the rooftop across the street, he had an audience. A normal person would feel concerned if they realized that someone had been watching them inside their own private space, especially while they had been sleeping. In fact, he tried to pinpoint the reason that his body didn’t react like he thought it would, why didn’t he feel a sense of panic?

He let the song wash over him, maybe the song held the key to everything? The mild music continued to fill his apartment while he walked over to his windows and lifted one open as far as it would go. A cold breeze pushed past him and fluttered his thin curtains. Goose pimples rose up on his exposed skin; the song of the wind chimes blended together with the ethereal melodies of Billie Holiday as he went back to the kitchen for his coffee. Without intention, now all his actions were measured to perfection because he imagined protective eyes watching him. He pulled another mug out of his cabinet and poured a second cup. He walked over to the window and set the steaming cup on the window sill, feeling slightly foolish. He went over to his love seat, curled underneath his pile of blankets; opening his laptop and setting it down on his coffee table. There was only one way he was going to get through this sickness; lots of hot liquids, all his blankets and binge-watching Gossip Girl. Only he was distracted, every few minutes looking over to the windows to see that the coffee mug was still there every time. He knew the man would never come if he knew he was being watched. Once he stopped looking, he could feel the insistent pull of sleep pushing him back under.
He jolted awake when a rough knock at the door shocked him out of sleep. He looked at his laptop and it was asking, “Are you still watching?”. He sat up and out of his love seat, his back and neck in a ton of pain. He was surprised that he had been able to fall asleep on the tiny couch. He knew he was small guy but usually that only happened when he was incredibly exhausted. The knocking continued. He walked over, his steps quiet and sluggish. He opened the door to see Sam standing there with a slightly concerned look on his face. In his hands, a to-go bag that he immediately recognized.

“You didn’t…” Steve said with a smile.

“Your sickness cure, Won Ton soup from Uncle Tsang’s. Who’s your best friend?” Sam said, his worried smile now a shit-eating grin. Steve couldn’t help but laugh even if it hurt to do so. He moved out of the doorway so that Sam could enter the apartment. Sam set the soup down on the coffee table and began to pull all the items out of the bag; Steve watched him move, his movements were quick and smooth, each one could be anticipated.

“No wonder your sick man, this window is wide open.” Sam said as he rushed to close the window, shutting off the flow of cool air. He moved the coffee cup off the window sill and took it to the kitchen; setting it gently in the sink. Steve rushed over to his side and looked at the cup, it was empty. He could feel a rush of nervous energy begin in his arms and travel all the way through his body and stopping in the pit of his stomach. His stranger had accepted his offer, a smile played across his lips.

“Hey, are you listening?” Hearing Sam’s voice broke him free from his thoughts and he realized that Sam had been talking and he definitely had no memory of what he had been saying.

“Sorry Sam, I’m just feeling really out of it.” Steve apologized and went back to his chair, covered himself once again in his blankets so that he could tuck into his soup. Sam followed him and sat down on a chair that he had pulled over to the coffee table and began to open his plastic containers of food. He looked over at Steve’s laptop and let out a hearty laugh.

“Are you watching Gossip Girl again?” He said as he opened the top of his food container and the comforting scent of steamed vegetables and heavy sauce swarmed the air around them.

“It’s my go-to when I’m feeling sick.” Steve tried to defend his taste in television.

“Yeah, and you’re sick a lot.” Sam said, playfully. He couldn’t be upset with Steve, everyone had their quirks and Steve had many. He felt protective over the smaller man and not just for the obvious reasons; his size really didn’t have much to do with it. The comforting qualities that Steve possessed caused most people to want to take care of him. Because of this, Sam was perfectly content in spending the next few hours eating his food and watching television. By the time he had stood up to leave, the sun had well set over the horizon. He said a quick goodbye, simply asking him to not go into work tomorrow unless he was feeling 100%. Steve nodded and waved him out of the apartment.

The moment Sam stepped out of the Brownstone building that Steve lived in, the chilly night air assaulted him like a ton of bricks. It had been so warm inside the apartment that he didn’t think twice about the weather outside. He quickly walked across the street towards his car. A small, baby blue 1967 Volkswagen. He got into the driver’s seat and before he could put the keys in the ignition, a voice from behind startled him.

“Agent Wilson.” A velvet voice, someone who had clearly mastered the art of surprise. His hand instinctively went towards his glove compartment, he knew he had his Colt inside. All those times he thought it crazy to keep his gun in the car, he couldn’t believe he found himself in such a situation.

“Please, I removed your gun from your glove compartment the moment I got into your car…Agent.” She said with a hint of sarcasm in her voice. All Sam could see of her was the fire red hair reflective in the rear-view mirror.

“Agent? You have the wrong guy, lady.” Sam said, trying to keep his voice calm and even so as not to seem like a threat. Although, from his first impression, this woman didn’t seem like someone who would find a lot of things threatening.

“Agent Samuel Thomas Wilson, got recruited by S.H.I.E.L.D. after being honorably discharged from the U.S. Air Force at the age of 26. You took up station in upstate New York for the Nomad Project- “She could have continued but Sam interrupted her.

“Okay great, so you know me. What do you want?” Sam couldn’t help but be irritated. It had been nearly five years since he had left S.H.I.E.L.D., five years since the infiltration of Hydra had been revealed and now he was living a comfortable life. He didn’t think he had done anything to deserve the past bubbling up to the surface.

"My name is Romanoff, my partner and I work for S.H.I.E.L.D. The new S.H.I.E.L.D. that we’ve had to rebuild from the ground up. We’re helping people, helping the world but lately, my partner has been distracted.” Natasha was trying to explain the situation in layman’s terms, trying to find the easiest way to explain everything without giving anything away. It was imperative that she be completely understood.

“What does this have to do with me?” Sam was starting to lose her patience. For someone who broke into his car and waited for him, she was taking a hell of long time getting to the point.

“Not you. What can you tell me about your friend Steve?” Sam froze in place, everything around him stopped. The only sound was of Agent Romanoff’s breathing coming from his backseat. His hands tightened on his steering wheel.

“Why would you want to know about Steve?” It was difficult to keep his voice even; this woman was skating on very thing ice.

“My partner has been watching him, following him and I’m not sure why. Whenever I ask him about it, he leaves; disappears. Ignores me until it’s time for the next mission. Did you friend Steve have anything to do with Project Nomad or...or the Department X program?” Natasha asked finally, she didn’t know what kind of response she would get. Sam sighed, a lungful of regrets. He finally put his keys in the ignition and started the car, it’s small engine roaring to life.

“If we’re going to talk about this, we’re going to a secure location.” He said sternly, Natasha didn’t have the heart to deny him. She let him pull the car away from Steve’s building and off into the night.

It was still early in the evening in the city that never sleeps, it still took them nearly forty minutes to drive from Steve’s apartment in Brooklyn to Harlem, where Sam resided. His apartment wasn’t much larger than Steve’s, but it was where Sam felt most comfortable after leaving S.H.I.E.L.D. Home was as good a place as any.

“Do you want a beer?” Sam offered, and Natasha only raised her eyebrows back at him. Sam laughed, “Okay, no beer. Well, I’m going to have one since the story is kinda long and complicated.” He walked out and into his kitchen, he dug through the contents of his fridge for a moment until he found some beers all the way in the back. He walked back to his kitchen table, where Natasha sat silently waiting.

“So, it started in 1944…” Sam started as he took a seat across from Natasha.

“You’re from 1944?” Natasha asked with a disbelieving smile. Sam rolled his eyes.

“No. Steve is.” Sam said bluntly. Natasha searched for any kind of sarcasm on his face but there was none. He was being completely honest. Natasha understood the world that she was a part of, anything was possible, so she waited for him to continue.

“He was born in 1918, small like you see him now. Grew up in Brooklyn. Always wanting to do his part, when the War broke out all he wanted to do was join. He got rejected by the Army dozens of times, too small and too…fragile. Until Dr. Erskine took notice of him. Erskine—”

“He founded the Super Soldier Program.” Natasha interrupted. The Serum was legendary. Even though there had been no recorded successes, Hydra had always tried their best to replicate the idea.

“Right. He selected Steve to be the first test subject. It didn’t take. After the injection, there seemed to be no physical changes so everyone wrote it off as a failure. Until Erskine noticed the slightest of enhancements. Heightened senses, mental processing, stats were all beyond the expert level. He stopped aging completely. He was the Nomad project. It all started with him.” Natasha was still confused. The man she had seen in the bookshop didn’t seem like someone who was enhanced in any way.

“He was kept in a S.H.I.E.L.D. facility since the 50’s., kept on ice unless he was truly needed. He’s had numerous handlers over the years, people who helped him recover from Cryo or just to get him acclimated to whatever decade he was brought back in. I became his handler in 2008, five years before we found out about the Hydra infiltration. We spent almost all his time off ice together, listening to old records and talking about how different the world is now. I tried to tell him as much as I could because he was always in the facility; he never got to see the outside world.” Sam took another long pull of his beer, waiting to see if Natasha had anything to say. He could see that she was trying to process everything, and he gave her a moment to do so. It actually felt good to get everything off his chest.

“When it had leaked that Hydra had been living and growing inside S.H.I.E.L.D., I learned of their plans for the Nomad Project. For Steve. They felt that the mind was enough, what use was the body? It wasn’t enough to just help him escape, we had to hide completely in plain sight. Steve knew the best way to increase his chances of survival was to completely wipe him clean; start over again and Hydra would have no use for him. So, we did. Clean slate, escaped back to Crown Heights and built a normal life for him. A normal, 26-year-old artist, who works in a bookstore and drinks an excessive amount of coffee.” Sam finished with a sad smile.

“But, his memories…” Natasha was trying to process everything that Sam had explained to her.

“All fabricated. Besides the new ones he’s made over the last five years.” Sam said with a shrug. He finished his beer, setting the bottle down on the kitchen table in front of him. He could see the wheels in Natasha’s mind spinning.

“You said he stopped aging, what about when he gets sick?” Natasha thought she had cracked him.

“Psychosomatic. I think there is a part of his body that remembers the feelings of being sick, or nauseous and he believes that he is feeling that way. He’s never actually sick. He goes to sleep and wakes up the next morning feeling perfectly healthy.” Sam said, another shrug gracing his shoulders. Natasha stood and began to make her way towards the door of his apartment.

“Something that you have to understand, Agent Romanoff.” That stopped her dead, hand already on the door knob. She turned to look at him, he had stood from his chair and his arms were folded over his broad chest.

“Five years ago, I did everything in my power to protect Steve and not just because I was his handler. I walked away from that life, I’m not a soldier anymore. But I will continue to protect Steve with everything I’ve got so, maybe you should explain that to your partner. The last thing I need is for him to lead the wrong kind of people to Steve’s door.” The stood, looking eye to eye. Sam could tell that she understood him. She gave him a curt nod before she was out the door. Sam counted to ten before he let himself relax.

Once Sam had left Steve’s apartment, Steve walked back over to the window and lifted it back open. It had become quite a chilly night, the dark clouds looming overhead. He walked back over to his record player, the same Billie Holiday record sitting in the same place it was that morning. He turned it on, picked up the needle and set it back down on the spinning record. Gentle music filtered through the speakers and surrounded him once again. He wanted something to drink but he knew it was too late for coffee or tea, it would keep him up for the rest of the night and he needed to be well for work in the morning.

He looked in his refrigerator and saw a large jug of ice tea. He poured himself a glass, over ice. He chanced a glance at his window and he could have sworn he saw some slight movement. There was a small part of him that felt foolish, pulling out another glass and filling it with a few ice cubes. He filled the glass with iced tea and he walked over to his window. He set both glasses down on his sill and walked over to his love seat; only to grab his favorite blanket and pillow. He went back over to the window, sitting down against the wall right next to it.

The pillow perched against the wall to support his back, he pulled the blanket closer around him. He picked up his glass and took a long, refreshing gulp. The second glass sat on the window sill for a few minutes, but Steve could still feel the odd prickle on his skin, a sign of someone watching him.

“It’s just regular ice tea, there’s no sugar. I don’t really like the taste of added sugar, I like to taste the drinks as their meant to be tasted. I…hope that’s okay.” He spoke towards the open window, his curtains flowing in the night time air. There was nothing but the sound of Billie’s smooth voice, singing back towards him. As the song was about to end, he saw it. A slow, tentative hand reached through the threshold of the window and took the ice tea. Steve smiled.

“I'll find you in the morning sun,
And when the night is new,
I'll be looking at the moon,
But I'll be seeing you.”