Fire and Smoke - Wanda Maximoff x Reader

Chapter 43

Stark, and by extension, I suspect, Natasha, keeps Wanda and me locked up in the hospital room for the entire night. I assume the trio are debating what to do with us instead of going to bed, but it doesn't seem like any of them really do need much sleep anyway. I, on the other hand, am a different story. Even having been given extra fluids to try to help my body recuperate from the time-travel, I feel way drowsier than normal and find myself drifting off into deep sleep, just to be woken up several times during the night with the room spinning around me. Wanda stays on her side of the uncomfortable bed the entire night, and she doesn't complain each time I jerk awake. She only rearranges the covers or the pillows underneath my head and snuggles up next to me until I fall asleep again -which doesn't take too long. Each time I awaken in the dark room, I get a feeling that Wanda is just lying there, not sleeping at all. I'm too tired to ask her, though, so we spend the night like that, repeating the same patterns over and over again until eventually, the sun rises.

I awaken feeling clammy again, and for the first time, Wanda isn't right next to me. The realization thereof, or the lack of her warm body next to me makes me shiver as I turn slightly to try to find her in the small, sterile room, wondering if she's managed to get out and left me. My doubts are proven to be just that though, as my eyes fall upon her sitting on a chair, her back towards me, knees drawn up towards her chest and her arms hugging her legs close to her chest as she looks out of the window. The soft morning light strokes her skin amorously, making her glow slightly, her hair as ever looking like it is filled with sparkling rubies. From my vantage point, I can only see some of her face, but I can instantly tell she looks sad. My heart sinks as it always seems to do nowadays when I see her like this. She's resting her head on her knees, her lashes ever so softly occasionally batting down as she blinks. I follow her gaze, looking out onto an awakening New York City from where we are up high in the clouds, it feels like.

I look back at Wanda, feeling her to be much more interesting to look at than whatever is going on outside, down below. I wish I could summon up the strength -or the courage, to get off this stupid bed and walk up to her and hug her and try to take some of her sadness away. But, if grief suits anyone, it suits Wanda like an expensive perfume.

Wanda sighs, completely unaware that I've woken up. She traps her bottom lip between her teeth, chewing on it in contemplation, lost in whatever world she's concocted inside her head. I stare, forgetting that I am staring, and I briefly wonder what it would feel like to hold her, to kiss her. I don't like to live in a world of what-ifs, though, and knowing what I know about Wanda, thoughts like the ones I've found myself starting to allow to materialize lately exist solely in that world of what if. And yet, they keep coming to me like small little pricks of a needle, and I can't quite make myself stop.

As if on cue, Wanda turns her head towards me, still gnawing on her lip. She catches my eyes and smiles when she sees that I'm awake, a motion that forces that stupid lip out from between her teeth.

"Good morning." She greets me, her voice low after the night of rest.

"Mornin'" I mumble, embarrassed to have been caught staring and I sincerely hope she wasn't listening in on my thoughts just then.

"Slept well?" Wanda enquires, hugging her knees slightly tighter towards her.

"You know I didn't." I sigh and let my gaze drift back out of the window, as if that was what I was originally looking at. "I'm sorry for waking you."

"You didn't." She replies softly.

She keeps her head turned towards me for a little while until she too, turns back to look out of the window.

"I never spent much time here." She says, clearly resuming her train of thought from earlier. "I only lived in the Compound."

"It must've been nicer." I say, thinking of how overwhelming it must be for Wanda to be in the middle of a buzzing city filled with millions of thoughts each clamoring for her attention.