Natasha had moved onto the next episode by the time Emily arrived. Emily was slowly becoming more comfortable around her and the two chatted for a few minutes before she headed back to Kate’s room.
She was sporting ripped jeans, an oversized sweater, and heeled boots today, her long hair down and brushed over one shoulder. Kate’s door was open, so Emily stuck her head around the frame and peered in the room before entering. “Knock knock.”
No sooner had Kate re-entered her bedroom than Lucky had come padding in behind her and hopped up to sprawl out on the bed with her. She was still laying like that, Lucky’s head on her chest while she stroked through his fur with one hand and the other was occupied with a new attempt at TikTok scrolling, when she heard Emily’s voice.
She looked up with a smile and turned off her phone, tucking it back into her pocket. “Hey, you. Come over here and get comfy, these are prime snuggle hours.” Lucky gave a quiet little woof that Kate took as agreement. She chuckled and rubbed behind his ears.
Emily’s smile was soft and genuine as she moved into Kate’s room. It had basically become her home away from home as she spent nearly as much time in it as she did in her own apartment. She pulled off her boots and sank down onto the bed with Kate and Lucky. She snuggled in close on Kate’s other side and simultaneously kissed her girlfriend hello and gave Lucky some chin scratches.
Kate eagerly returned that kiss, free hand lifting to cup Emily’s cheek and keep her lingering a little while. “Hi,” she murmured again. “Missed you today.” Patrol hadn’t left them the opportunity to see each other before Emily went into work at Al’s, but thankfully, it had been light enough that she’d gotten away with texting for a little while. “How was your night?”
Em smiled into the kiss and enjoyed the feeling of Kate’s hand on her cheek. Her hand abandoned petting Lucky to wrap around Kate’s waist and pull her in closer. “It was good,” she replied when their kiss ended. “But it’s much better now. How was yours?”
Kate pulled her arm from around Lucky and shifted to fit a little more comfortably between her dog and her girlfriend. The golden retriever huffed and rose, as if inconvenienced, but eventually settled back down on what was typically Emily’s side of the bed, sprawled out across the length of Kate’s back. She let her hand stroke Emily’s neck, the other tucking up under her arm while she tangled their legs together.
“Much better now, too,” she agreed, once she could finally be still. She stole another soft kiss. “You feel really good.”
As Kate readjusted her position, Emily settled in more comfortably against the pillows. Her body relaxed into the mattress gratefully. She’d taken up self-defense lessons with Natasha, and that combined with a job that had her on her feet all day, she was definitely feeling it.
“I’m glad you think so,” she chuckled softly. “Because I feel like an 80 year old grandma walking around with all these sore muscles.”
“I call that the Natasha Effect,” Kate joked, rubbing one hand up and down Emily’s back. “I’d been training in some way for ten-plus years and the first time I sparred with her…” She grimaced playfully. “I felt like shit for three days afterwards. You’ll get used to it, though, promise. And I’m always here for backrubs.”
She still came away from her training sessions sore, often, but she recovered much faster these days. She wouldn’t trade it for the world, anyway. Nat had much more practical field experience, and that was what she’d needed.
“I mean, I know I’m just at the beginner stuff, so I can’t even imagine what you probably feel like after your sparring sessions.” Emily had been an athlete for most of her life, and even that hadn’t prepared her much for Natasha Romanoff. “We should go hit the hot tub at the Tower soon. Not tonight, obviously, because I am so not moving from this spot, but soon.”
“Soon,” Kate agreed. She would never be one to turn down a soak in the hot tub, but tonight, she was cozy. She really just wanted to exist with Emily right now, tucked up into her like they were almost one being. This was her favorite way to snuggle up to all her favorite people, personal space be damned. She didn’t even feel her usual need to fill the comfortable silence.
But, remembering her talk with Nat, she knew she couldn’t go radio silent just yet. She had to put forth a little effort to be communicative first. She took a pointed breath.
“Hey, so, I know I’ve been getting kind of distracted lately.” She brushed her thumb across Emily’s cheek, her expression a bit sheepish. “I’ve been kind of in my head about this last year, after I hit my one year here, but I hope you don’t think it’s had anything to do with you.”
Emily tensed just slightly before Kate even began speaking. It was that sharp inhale of breath that just felt loaded. It was a I have to tell you something breath and she’d heard it many times before. Once Kate got the words out however, she relaxed a bit. “I noticed.” She put her hand on Kate’s leg comfortingly. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Kate bit her lip when she noticed Emily tense in her arms, but as soon as she relaxed again, so did Kate. That probably could have been phrased a little better, but she was glad her assurance seemed to be working. This really wasn’t anything to do with Emily at all; it was just this resurgence of old feelings that she’d never truly put behind her, and she had to deal with it.
“No, baby, you’re perfect.” She smiled again, every word firm and steady. “It’s just… last year around now, I was with Elsa, and I’ve just had her on my mind. We didn’t really get to end, you know?”
Emily stilled. They didn’t exactly talk about Elsa a lot, but she knew. Knew that they’d been together and that they’d been separated without warning by Vallo’s whims. In that moment, she couldn’t help but think about Maya; who she had loved and who was also ripped away unexpectedly.
Emily met Kate’s gaze with a sympathetic nod. “It’s okay, Kate. I actually know almost exactly what you’re going through right now. It’s okay that you still miss her.”
Kate hadn’t expected to feel such a wave of relief at those words. Deep down, she’d known Natasha was right. She’d known Emily would understand, that she could handle this better than Kate was giving her credit for. Part of her had still been expecting worse, maybe because she was drawing comparisons between her situation with Elsa and Nat’s with Carol, but it didn’t work that way. Kate wasn’t Nat, and these situations weren’t the same.
“I do,” she admitted. “I miss her.” They had been together just shy of seven months, living together for just under a month, then suddenly, her name was on the disappearance list. Her first real love, gone like she’d never been there at all. It was difficult to process.
“Maya?” she asked tentatively. She knew only the barest details about Emily’s first girlfriend, the most prominent being that she had died. Infinitely less complicated than falling in love with and losing a nineteenth-century fictional queen to the whims of a pocket universe but much, much more fucked up.
Emily nodded and snuggled in closer to Kate’s side. “Yeah.” She still wasn’t ready to share the gritty details of Maya’s murder, or about Lyndon and everything that had happened afterward, but she could at least share some of her emotions. “We had been fighting when she went missing, and after I lost her, there was so much I still wanted to tell her. Even when I did eventually start moving on, I would still miss her. I still miss her to this day. I don’t think either of us should feel guilty for that.”
“Yeah.” Kate kissed Emily’s forehead, shifting to run her fingers through her hair. She didn’t even want to imagine how horrible that must feel, knowing the last things you’d said to someone you loved were coming from anger. At least she and Elsa had been happy before she’d disappeared, even with the possibility of just what had to come to pass always lingering in the backs of their minds.
“Nat suggested saying stuff out loud,” she continued after a moment. “Like, stuff I didn’t get to say to her while she was still here, or what I’d want to say to her now. I don’t know if I’m going to, but…sounds like it might help?”
Emily considered that. “It couldn’t hurt to try. I mean, in the worst case scenario it doesn’t work and you’re still right where you are now.”
Kate smiled, unsurprised that Emily was echoing the sentiment. For all she worried about pissing off Natasha and Yelena by being too present at the house, she and Natasha were in the same mind about things fairly often. They had the same steadiness that Kate craved so much.
“What do you do when you miss Maya?”
Emily smiled back and gave Kate another reassuring squeeze. Grief was always hard, especially in the beginning. She knew Kate was dealing with some complicated things, but she was glad that she felt comfortable enough to open up to her about it.
“It might sound cheesy, but I just…let myself think about her. Early on, everything hurt and I would just try to distract myself all the time. I didn’t want to feel all those negative emotions, but they’re still there, waiting. Eventually I learned that when I missed her, the best thing to do was just sit with it, you know? So I go on walks and listen to music that she liked. I think about happy memories and try to imagine what she’d say to me if she was here.”
“It’s not cheesy, I think it’s sweet.” Hell, even if it was cheesy, that was Emily’s right. This was the absolute last thing Kate would ever pass judgment on. Someone you loved dying on you, no matter who it was, never stopped hurting. She still missed her dad every day – she and Emily had that in common, lost fathers. If the person she’d been in love with had died, she couldn’t imagine how that would feel. She didn’t want to.
“Thank you,” she murmured. “For getting it. I was afraid you’d think me missing her meant I didn’t want you, and that’s not true. Not at all.”
Emily reached over to Kate’s hand and brought it to her lips. She pressed a soft kiss to the back of it. “Thank you for sharing with me. I know it can be hard to open up, especially about things like this. And you can take whatever time you need, I promise I’ll be okay.”
Butterflies sparked to life in Kate’s stomach with that kiss brushed over her hand. She was quick to lace their fingers together and nuzzle in, nose brushing Emily’s. Even without the reassurances, just being here with her – close, soaking up the heat of her body – put her completely at ease. She was just so patient, so good. Kate had lucked out, finding two amazing women she was so crazy about in a world away from her own.
“I love you,” she said softly. She looked a little surprised to have said that out loud, but it quickly melted away and was replaced with pure softness. Maybe the timing was a little off, but she’d always been one to go off feelings more than anything, anyway. No regrets.
Her eyebrows shot upward in surprise, but Emily recovered quickly as another smile spread itself over her face. The look she gave Kate then made it clear that she felt exactly the same way. “I love you too.”
There was clearly only one way to respond to that. Kate’s hands curled into the fabric of Emily’s sweater and she kissed her, deeper than she had all night, messy and a little frantic with excitement.
Emily let herself be pulled in and lost herself in that kiss. She met Kate’s franticness with something more steady, though no less urgent. She kissed her way down Kate’s throat until she reached her collarbone, enjoying the way she could feel her girlfriend’s pulse thrumming underneath her skin.
She brought her hand down and placed it lightly over Kate’s heart, then looked up to meet her gaze again. She did love her. Somehow in this world of magic and chaos, she’d found something that she’d been missing for a long, long time.
Her breath catching slightly, Emily leaned down to kiss her again and again and again.