You are tired. Tired of feeling like you’re not good enough for anything, tired of pretending to be perfectly fine, and you are tired of hiding just how bone-achingly tired you really feel.
No one knows you feel this way. In fact, the other Avengers probably think you’re the most well-adjusted person on the team. You don’t have a tragic backstory, or some mutation that caused you to stand out and get recruited. You were recruited because you were a S.H.E.I.L.D. agent who excelled in training, both in physical and intellectual tests, and because you were quick to pick up languages, which was useful when the team needed to gather information in foreign countries.
You’re the one the other Avengers come to when they need help getting through or forgetting their own problems. You’re always there, with a smile and a joke, or a listening ear. But you never reciprocate, never go to them when you feel down. It’s not because you think they would turn you away, or because they might think less of you. It’s just that they have so many other things to focus on, and their problems are so much more important than yours. You don’t deserve to take any of their time, and they don’t need you to just be another problem they have to be burdened with.
So, you fake it. When you are around the others, you laugh, and joke, and make sure you have one of the brightest smiles in the room. You fill your days with every distraction you can, from training and going on missions, to cleaning the tower, and cooking meals.
But at night, when everyone else is asleep, there isn’t anything to distract you. You have tried everything you can think of to make this feeling go away. Steve says that drawing either helps him to realize what is bothering him or it helps him forget it, but to you, an empty piece of paper in front of you is not a drawing board. You’ve read and even told other people that writing can help you to “actualize your problems”. So, you write. You have filled entire pages, but all that does is take what you feel, what you’re trying to get away from, and put it in front of your eyes, instead of just in your head.
No matter what you try, you can’t hide. Not from yourself. Thoughts invade your mind, screaming at you that you are worthless, that you mess up too much, that you get in the way.
You just want it all to go away. And that’s why you are where you are, standing on a ledge on the top of Stark Tower. The wind whips around your body as you stare out at the city that surrounds you.
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For whatever reason, Sam can’t get you out of his mind. It’s three am, and as tired as he is from the workout he went through trying to keep up with Steve, he can’t sleep. There was something about you today that just seemed a little bit off, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. You hadn’t been hiding, or avoiding anyone. You hadn’t been angry, or even a little bit moody. There was absolutely nothing to indicate that something was wrong, but he couldn’t shake this feeling.
After hours of lying in bed, trying unsuccessfully to sleep, he decides to go see if you were still awake. If you were, he would ask you if there was anything wrong, and if you were asleep, then he would wait until morning for the two of you to talk.
Seeing light shining from the crack underneath your door, Sam knocks. When there is no answer, he slowly opens the door. Quietly he calls out to you. When there is no answer, he peeks in, expecting to see you fell asleep reading and left the light on. When there is no sign of you, he furrows his brow. “Y/N?” he says louder, walking over to the bedside table to turn the touch lamp up a little brighter. As he does, he sees the pieces of paper on your bed. Unable to contain his curiosity, he cranes his neck to read the top sheet. What he reads takes his breath away.
I hate this feeling of emptiness. I wish I could tell someone, but they don’t need to hear my problems. They all have enough of their own. I have tried, but it never goes away, and I can’t take it anymore. I just want to be done with it all.
Sam grabs the other papers, and quickly reads through them. He reads about how you don’t feel good enough, don’t feel like you really belong. He reads about your depression, and how you sometimes lie awake at night staring at the ceiling because you can’t even muster the strength it takes to close your burning eyes.
“FRIDAY?” he calls out into the empty room. “Yes sir?” the AI system answers. “Where is Y/N right now?”
“I believe she went up to the roof.”
Sam races out of your room, dropping the papers to the floor in his rush. He sprints up the stairs, only slowing down so he doesn’t burst through the door and startle you. When he opens the door that leads up to the roof, he breathes a sigh of relief to see you still standing there, although you’re too close to the ledge for him to relax.
You turn at the sound of the door. When you see Sam standing there looking at you, you can’t help but ask “Sam, are you okay?”
Your question almost brings Sam to tears. Even when you were so depressed that you couldn’t bear it anymore, you still place other people’s needs above your own. “I should be asking you that.” He softly replies. You drop your head, and your response is so quiet he has to strain to hear it. “You don’t need to worry about me.”
“Y/N, look at me, please.” Sam says, stepping closer to you. The way his voice nearly cracked saying your name catches your attention, and tugs your gaze up to him. “I want to worry about you. I want you to be able to talk to me.”
The emotion you hear in his voice pulls at you, and you turn your face away from him again. “It’s not worth the time.” Then softly, so softly it is almost lost in the wind, “I’m not.”
Now Sam can no longer hold back the tears that run down his cheeks. “You are worthy. Regardless of whether you are happy and able to do anything in the world, or if you are so depressed you can’t even make yourself get out of bed in the morning, you deserve to be alive. You are worthy of affection and attention.”
“You’re just saying that,” you mumble, not even able to lift your eyes to meet his. “That doesn’t make it true.”
“No, me saying it doesn’t make it true, just like me saying the sun will come up in the morning doesn’t make it true. The sun doesn’t come up because I say it will. It will come up tomorrow, even if I argue that it won’t. You’re not worthy of anything just because I say you are, but I say you are worthy of love because I know it’s true. And it’s not because you’re an Avenger, not because you have helped save the world, and not because you are the most beautiful woman I have ever met. You deserve to be alive and to have love because you are you, and there is nobody else like you in the world. Even if no one ever tells you again, and even if you don’t believe it, you are worthy.” He said, emphasizing those last three words.
Unable to hold back anymore, you begin to break down, letting out the emotions that you had pent up for so long. Sobs rack your body, until you nearly fall, but then Sam is there to catch you. He holds you to his chest, letting you cry. After a while, when your tears show no signs of letting up, he simply picks you up, and carries you down from the roof. As he moves into your room, you grab ahold of his shirt, unable to speak through the tears. Still, he understands you.
“Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be right here.”
And as he sits on your bed, holding you to his chest, he promises you that he will be there, whenever you need him, for as long as it takes.
“I’ll always be right here.”