100 Marvel One Shots✔️

Lemongrass and Happiness >> Pre-Serum!Steve Rogers X Reader

Title: Lemongrass and Happiness

Paring: Pre-Serum Steve Rogers X Reader

Warnings: angst, World War II, HYDRA, friends to lovers, fluff

Spoilers: for the whole timeline of Captain America from 1941 - present? Go watch Captain America: The First Avenger, Avengers, and Captain America: The Winter Solider  right now. I don't care if it's 11:43PM or you're late for the bus, it's law.

Requested By: rebelliousoreo ✌️

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In 1937, you met Steven Rogers. Just graduated high school, you were supposed to be waiting tables in a Brooklyn bar, looking for a husband. But what your father and step-momma didn't know, was those pennies weren't being saved, and you weren't going out with the gals to meet boys. You bought a sketch book and applied to Art School. You were just nineteen years old with a head full of dreams, and so was Steve. You shared your sandwich with him once when he had nothing in his bag, and ever since, you were fast friends.

Today, you were perched on the windowsill, waiting for the professor to enter. It was better to sit away from the others, because Steve had a hard time hearing you with the noise of everyone else around. But, instead of chatting, you were sitting in silence, leaning against the window, against each other.

You glance to the clock above the chalkboard and check your wristwatch. You frown, and glance to Steve. "Professor McMullin is late," you tell him.

Steve blinks. "He's never late." But as he says that, in comes Prof McMullin, arms full of rolled-up canvases and hair awry. He must have run from the train station, because his slacks are muddied, and cheeks are a shade of pink. "What do you think –,"

"My apologies, students," Professor McMullin placed all the canvases upon his desk by the side, and from his shoulder bag, withdrew a newspaper. You glance to Steve, puzzled, but your teacher reads aloud, "There's talk in the press of a war beginning in Europe," he says, and stroking his face, adds, "These dark times descending...but now's not the time to talk of that sort of thing. I'm sure you're all itching to sketch still life, yes?"

The class follows the instructions of Professor McMullin, as do you and Steve. In the centre of the room is a bowl of fruit, but every time you try and correct the curve of the pear upon your page, you can't help but think of the war. When you glance to Steve, you see he has the same sort of trouble, and instead of sketching the fruit, there's a portrait of your profile under his pencil's tip.

"You've got that look in your eye, Stevie," you say, bending your head not to attract attention.

He doesn't look at you when he replies, "What look?"

"The one that you have right now," you whisper, ignoring the glares from other students. "Like you have when you're about to do something stupid." He's silent, perhaps ignoring your words, and you add, quieter, "Whatever it is, count me in."

Two years later, you're still scraping pennies to pay for Auburndale, but it isn't the same since Steve dropped out last month. There's nobody to chat with, nobody to watch out for, nobody to sneakily patch up in your house after he'd been roughhoused by bullies. It's hard. When your father catches wind that you've one more year away from being a commissionable artist, he isn't mad, but impressed. He doesn't get why you spend so much time around Steve, though.