A/N: Hope everyone has recovered from the previous chapter♥️ Oh boy, did I get a lot of angry messages. To those of you that are still here: I love you for sticking with me and hopefully you'll read these last two. I know the two lovebirds didn't get the happy ending you all were hoping for, but I stand by my decision to give them a beautifully emotional ending.
TW: Mental health issues, depression, mention of substance abuse. I promise it's not too dark of a chapter and it just lightly mentions these concepts. BUT they're in there. Stay safe♥️
Also, I feel like I shouldn't have to say this, but since Peter is in this chapter-- NO NWH SPOILERS PLEASE!!! I'm sure there are some other readers that haven't seen it yet.
~
The morning was foggy and the sky was gray. The sun had barely risen and even then, it was hidden by all the clouds. That signature, gloomy northwest fall had started in. When everything was muffled. Muted.
Especially since most of the town was still asleep... save for the group of teens loading boxes and furniture onto a moving truck.
"Wanda, you're not pulling your weight," Peter grunted between his clenched teeth. "You need to push up and over," he explained.
"Shut up, Parker. I'm trying."
"Can I ask why you saved the heaviest thing for last?" Mj asked from where she stood in the back of the truck, guiding the large piece of furniture into place.
"I honestly wasn't going to take it," Wanda admitted through a strained voice. "I figured we could just put the mattress on the floor. But then I decided it would be good for storage. Ya know, to put things under considering how small the place is."
When the large wooden bed frame slid into place, they all let out exhausted breaths through their smiles and swiped their hands off. The sound of slow clapping came from just a few yards behind them.
They all turned around to find Dove in the same spot she'd been in for the last hour. On the first step of the front porch of the Maximoff home. "Took you losers long enough."
"No thanks to you," Wanda replied.
Dove shrugged in response, then pulled her knees tighter to her chest and tucked her hands into the pockets of her coat.
Wanda didn't blame Dove for not helping. She could see how tired she was in her eyes. They were drooped low and reddened from not sleeping. Dark circles made them look sunken. The girl looked sickly. Not that any of her friends were surprised. She had spent the last day getting drunker than they had ever seen her before. So she was battling a fierce hangover. Honestly, they were shocked she was even awake.
The last twenty-four hours had been some that Wanda desperately wanted to forget. Dove had been a nightmare. She was depressed one moment, then manic the next. In that short amount of time, she had found a way to make Wanda question if it was even a good idea for her to tag along to New York at all.
To Dove, it was all a blur. She was living in a daze. She didn't remember any of the bad parts, which was what she wanted. She didn't remember all the terrible things she said to Wanda. She didn't remember cutting her hair to her shoulders with shitty craft scissors at two in the morning. She didn't remember how long she sobbed on the floor of the bathroom.
And Dove wondered if maybe she had gone a little mad. Maybe she really was broken. After losing everyone she ever loved—save for her best friends— was she going to survive the heartache? Would she ever truly process the loss?
She didn't look like herself, nor did she act like it.
She had become calloused. Bitter towards the world. Shutting out every bit of emotion because she just couldn't. fucking. handle. it. She had spent her whole life drowning in emotion. Feeling everything she could as intensely as she could. Because she loved it. She loved abundance. Always wanting more, more, more.
Not now. She couldn't bear it. Her soul couldn't bear it.
"We need to leave already," Dove yelled over to her friends. "We gotta hit the road before the people start getting up for the day." She peered down the road nervously, as if she would somehow see her dad speeding towards her to stop her from leaving.
"Maybe if you weren't too hungover to help, we'd be done loading the truck" Wanda scolded her.
"Maybe you need to quit being so fucking uptight," Dove retorted.
It wasn't until after she spoke that she realized how rude she had been. She didn't like who she had become. But frankly, she didn't really care enough to change.
Dove rested her chin on her knees, watching her breath turn to fog as she released her deep breaths. Letting herself space out for a moment, the familiar rumble of a car rolling up to the house quickly snapped her out of it. Her head whipped up so fast it made her dizzy— not that it took much— and she saw a faded blue truck parking against the curb. Her brother was seated in the driver's seat.
Steve hopped out of the car and slammed the door shut behind himself. "Dove," he called.
Her eyes widened and she jumped to her feet. She spun around and started to rush towards the front door to escape him, but he jogged towards her. His long stride was no match for her hungover hobbling and he was gaining on her. "I'm not here to stop you," he explained.
She halted her movements and hesitated, before turning to find him standing only a few feet away. "Then why are you here?"
"I came to talk to you."
Softness took her over for only a second. His gentle voice coaxed out a familial comfort. She easily snapped herself out of it. "I'm not coming back home. And I'm not talking to mom and dad."
"I'm not asking you to do either of those things," he clarified. "As I said, I just came to talk."
All of Dove's friends stared in shock from where they stood over by the moving truck. Feeling like they had been caught redhanded, helping Dove skip town. All of them, scared of what was about to happen.
"How did you find me?"
"Where else would you have gone?"
Dove looked down. She knew he had a point.
Steve eyed his sister. Taking in her state. She looked like shit to put it simply. She looked dead. Frail. Like she had lost all that light that radiated from her. "How have you been?" he asked, despite already knowing.
"I've been great," Dove lied.
He nodded, forcing a tight-lipped smile. "I uh, I like your hair." He gestured to her choppy, unevenly cut locks.
"No you don't," she argued, knowing that it looked terrible.
He chuckled, enjoying her dry humor. "Yeah, no. I really don't," he admitted.
Dove let out a laugh of self-mockery, feeling tears creep up on her for some odd reason. Maybe she had missed her brother. Or maybe the notion of being connected with a family member. Or maybe just pleasant conversations with someone in general. "I had a rough night." She reached up, grabbing at the ends of her hair.
"A lot of those recently, huh?" He gave her a pitied look.
She nodded once.
"Look, I'm not gonna beat around the bush here," Steve started. "We both know you're skipping town and we both know what happened the other night with dad," his voice trailed off and he looked to his feet, "and with Bucky."
Dove's eye twitched. She hadn't actually heard his name said aloud since they split. No one had the guts to say it around her, nor could she say it herself. It was had been solely pronouns with him. Never his name.
"And?"
"I just wanted to say goodbye," he explained.
"Mom didn't want to come?"
Steve winced. "She's uh, she's been busy."
"Right. She's always fucking busy. I've barely seen her over the last few weeks. Do you realize that? I lost basically everything I care about in one night. And I needed her," Dove started to tear up.
"Dove..." he sighed, but she continued right over him with her rant.
"It's dad, isn't it? He told mom to not come to see me off, right? I know she knows I'm leaving. She talks to everyone. I'm sure Wanda's parents told her." She started to cry as she spoke, hating that she even cared. Hating that despite it all, deep down, she still needed her mom.
"She knows," Steve admitted, vaguely confirming Dove's assumption. He gave her a sympathetic look. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry for everything. I know they haven't been fair to you. Not once in your life."
Dove wiped her cheek with the back of her hand and that flame that had been residing in her rebuilt itself. "They made me fucking hate this town, you know that? I never felt like I fit in here, but they made me want to burn this place to the ground."
Steve's lips pressed to a thin line. Dove really sounded like their dad sometimes. He would never say that out loud because he's pretty sure he'd get a kick to the crotch, but it was true. As much as everyone said Dove had Sarah's heart, she had Joseph's temper.
"You and dad have always had a complicated relationship—"
"Complicated?" Dove scoffed. "I've hated him since I was a child."
"And at the same time, you craved his approval."
Her brows furrowed and her head jolted back. She was insulted by the insinuation. No matter how accurate it was. "None of that matters now anyway. I don't exist to them anymore."
He nodded softly, looking to his feet then back to her. "To be honest, part of me is happy all of this happened."
"You're... happy? You're happy I lost everything?"
"No. I'm not happy about that. Not at all. But I'm happy you're leaving."
Dove's expression darkened, her pink lips parting. "Okay, fuck you too then."
Steve pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm really screwing this up, aren't I?" He sighed. "I'm trying to say that I'm happy you're following your dreams. That you aren't letting anyone keep you trapped here."
She understood what he was trying to say then. She nodded in agreement before smiling sadly. "But at what cost? I have no home. No family. No—" Bucky. She bit her tongue. "No matter how happy I am to be going, I can't ever come back home."
"Good. Don't come back. Don't ever fucking come back here. Promise me."
"What?"
"Don't come back here because we both know you don't belong here. You need to go. Move on. Thrive. Live." Steve walked towards her as he spoke. "I never understood why you wanted to leave. But that was because I can thrive in a place like this. I like the slow pace and the small comforts we have here. But you? This place sucks the life out of you."
Dove looked down to her feet. "He asked me to stay for him."
Steve knew who 'he' was without even having to question it. He understood she wasn't ready to say Bucky's name. "He told me everything."
Her eyes flicked up to her brother and widened. "He did?"
"The other night, when you ended things, he called me over. I've never seen him so low before," Steve shook his head, "except maybe when his dad passed."
"Please don't make me feel worse about this, Steve."
"I'm not trying to. I want you to know you're not alone in this heartache."
"I know I'm not. And that's the worst part."
Steve winced, feeling guilty for reminding her of the fact that she hurt Bucky. And Dove didn't even know the half of it. She didn't know the way he had been talking the night they broke up. She didn't know how much the whole ordeal had changed him. How much it broke him.
"Think you'll say bye to him on your way out?"
Dove shook her head. "Goodbyes aren't my thing. He knows."
"You don't think you owe him one? At least to give him some closure?"
She shrugged, not wanting to even think about having to face Bucky again. Because the thought alone scared her. Part of her felt like if she saw him, she'd want to stay. She would give up everything she ever wanted for him.
"I think I fucked up, didn't I? Not just with the breakup, but this whole summer. Sometimes I feel like it was all a mistake. Like I never should've let myself fall for him because deep down I knew it never would've worked. Maybe this whole summer was just the cause of me looking to ruin myself." Dove let out a choked sob through a smile. She laughed at her own mistakes.
Steve pressed his lips tightly together, watching his sister crumble under the consequences of her own actions. "No. There's nothing wrong with what you did. You fell in love and it didn't work out. It happens." He rested a hand on her shoulder. "It takes real courage to let yourself fall for someone, knowing there won't be a happy ending."
Dove wrapped her arms around him, clinging to her brother. Wanting to memorize the moment. To store it in her head forever. Her fingertips traced over the slightly scratchy material of his jacket. "Thank you, Stevie."
She felt one arm wrap around her to accept the hug and the other move under her grip to reach into his pocket. "Here," he said, making her release him to look down at what he was holding.
In her brother's hand, there was a plain white envelope. Her lips turned down in confusion. She stared at it for a moment before hesitantly taking it from him. Carefully tearing it open, she peeked inside to find a single slip of paper. When she looked it over, she realized it was a check and her jaw dropped. It had to have been almost his entire earnings from the summer.
"I know it's not much." He shrugged. "Thing is, I also know you didn't really plan ahead for this move and no one else is gonna help you get your start in the city."
Dove was stunned as she looked back up at him, her eyes wide, tears swimming in her vision. "Steve, I can't accept this."
"I got no use for it anyways. I'd probably end up spending it on cheap beer and burgers between my classes," he joked. "You're the one going to do big things."
She shook her head. "I'll pay you back," she promised.
"No, you won't. Don't." Steve leaned down and kissed her gently on the cheek before backing away towards his truck. "You're gonna make a name for yourself, ya know that? If anyone can do it, it's you," he yelled from across the yard, smiling widely. "You can do it, Rogers."
A tear fell from the corner of Dove's eye and she laughed. Swiping her cheek with the back of her hand, she nodded. As she stood on the front lawn of the Maximoff house, she watched Steve hop into his car and head back down the road.
It wasn't until the faded blue truck was out of sight that she spared a look to her friends who were all still crowded on the sidewalk together, surrounded by the last few bags.
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Wanda called over, seeing Dove's smile and matching it herself. "Let's hit the road."
Dove nodded. Just as she was about to step off the porch, she stopped herself. She chewed her lip pensively. "Hey, Wands? Is your address book still in the kitchen?"
Wanda furrowed her brows. "Um, yeah, right by the phone. Why?"
"I'll be right back," Dove shouted before busting back through the front door.
All of her friends looked at each other in search of clarity. Although none of them knew what she was up to.
A beat later, she came rushing back out of the house and stopped beside the group, a bit breathless from running. "Okay, I'm ready."
Peter eagerly threw each of his arms around Dove and Wanda without a second thought of Dove's momentary disappearance. They could feel him trembling slightly and knew he was most likely holding back tears.
Dove felt warmth spreading through her chest. And it almost felt like her heart started to beat normally again, even if just for a second. For that fleeting moment, she felt like that cavity in her torso was gone. "We're gonna miss you guys," she confessed.
"We'll miss you too," Peter replied, glancing between Dove and Wanda.
Mj slowly joined the group, wrapping her arms around all of them. "It'll be okay, Pete. We're going to visit them, remember?"
"But that's going to be weeks apart between trips. We won't be able to just show up at each other's houses. It won't be the same," he argued as they all pulled back from the hug.
"You're right," Dove agreed. "It won't." A smile spread across her features, making it a hopeful notion rather than the sad sentiment Peter's had.
"How exciting," Wanda added, smiling just as widely as Dove.
Peter sniffled and allowed his lips to curl as a laugh burst from his chest. "I guess you're right."
~
A/N: One more left...
Gonna smoke a cigarette, make myself a very strong cocktail, do one final edit, and then I'll be posting the final chapter. I'm already emotional from this one. Standby!