To Noise Making ; Steve Rogers.

to noise making ; steve rogers.

track six of WASTELAND, BABY!

pairing ; steve rogers x mutant!gn!reader

synopsis ; pure silence never sat well with steve. it reminded him of all the time he had lost frozen in ice. so when he heard your loose, disjointed hums coming from the compound’s kitchen, he came seeking your voice out more and more.

words ; 4.5k

themes ; fluff, mild angst

warnings / includes ; mild cursing, implications of depression/ptsd but not explicit, descriptions of injury/blood, a mention of a toxic ex, one mention of biological warfare, reader is a mutant with the ability to manipulate matter, reader calls steve 'old man' and he calls them 'sweetheart' once, reader and tony are best friendos, this fic is basically a huge FUCK YOU to steve's ending in endgame, a kiss !! that tony rudely interrupts, mildly an avengers tower-reminiscent fic bcs they're my found family okay </3

main masterlist. set in the same universe as: blue jeans.

Silence accompanied Steve everywhere he went. 

It followed him through his morning—when he rose so early even the birds hadn’t started their day yet. When he went out for a quick jog, his shoes nearly mute against the sidewalk’s smooth concrete.When he showered with frigidly cold water right after, he stared wordlessly at the ground as the iridescent soap suds ran down his skin into the drain. 

It followed him through his afternoon—when he filled out paperwork for the latest recon mission. When he played a quiet game of Uno with Bucky over the kitchen counter during lunch. When he went outside, where the curious stares of strangers seemed to grow exponentially with each ticking second, and phone cameras were shoved into his face not two yards out the door. 

It followed him through the night—when he went on a blind date set up by Natasha, the dinner largely consisted of uncomfortable pauses, mostly because they really had nothing in common, and she’d also mentioned she wasn’t all that into blondes. When he later took his motorcycle out for a drive, stopping by an empty bridge to stare down at the river rushing by. When he slid into bed with naught a sound, digging his fist into his eyes until he hallucinated bright colors behind his eyelids. 

Pure silence never sat well with Steve. It reminded him of all the time he had lost frozen in ice. All the time that had slipped right between his fingers like fine grains of sand.

That morning was as ordinary as ever. He brushed his teeth. Ran a comb through his flaxen hair. Changed into his jogging clothes. Tied his shoes. And he slipped out of the compound, off for his daily run. 

When he came back, he was surprised to see Tony striding out of the kitchen—he wasn’t usually up this early. 

“Dishwasher’s broken,” the brunette told him, sipping a large mug of dark coffee as he stroked his stubble with his other hand. “Remind me to get that fixed, will you?”

Steve blinked, then nodded.

Satisfied, Tony bid him adieu with no more than a limp wave as he shuffled past him, off to the compounds laboratory. 

The rest of the day slid by as quiet as ever—paperwork, filing, having lunch with Natasha at a secluded Italian cafe, mission debrief with Sam, more paperwork, listening to Bucky complain about his cat scratching up his favorite henley, and finally, deciding he was hungry enough to make dinner. 

He rose out of his chair, stretching with a soft groan as his bones popped with the movement. Then, Steve made his way out of his room, making a bee-line for the kitchen. He wasn’t at all surprised to see the compound’s living room empty—Sam had left for Louisiana to visit his sister, Natasha was off on an impromptu mission with Clint, Tony was doing god knows what in his lab, and Bucky was busy reprimanding Alpine for destroying his most prized article of clothing.

With everybody gone, it should’ve been quiet. 

But it wasn’t.

Much to Steve’s mild surprise and curiosity, he could hear somebody in the kitchen. 

Who could it be? Bruce? No—Bruce had flown off to Switzerland for some sort of fancy science convention. Thor? It was possible, but probably not—the Norse god would’ve barged into his room asking how to use the microwave for the millionth time by now. 

Steve heard the clatter of pots. The sound of boiling liquid. A displeased noise, quietly followed by a frantic mutter, “Oh, too much, too much!” He heard water trickling down the drain.

Then, the humming started. It was loose and disjointed, following the tune of a song for a couple seconds at a time before taking a lengthy pause, only to pick up an entirely new melody a minute later.

It took him a moment to realize that lingering in the dark hallway whilst listening intently to someone in the kitchen was rather creepy, so Steve reared himself out of his thoughts and stepped into the light. 

Of course it was you. You were more or less new to the compound—a long-time, trusted friend of Tony’s from all the way back when he first built his Iron Man suit. You were recently brought onto the team due to your mutant abilities, uncanny intelligence, and Tony’s undeniable fondness for you. Besides that, Steve knew very little about you: he knew you were around the same age as him (at least the same age as when he was frozen), he knew you were a genius physicist, he knew you had the power to manipulate matter around you (which made you an excellent asset to the team), and he recalled Scott once mentioning that you were allergic to styrofoam. 

Steve assumed that the last one had been a joke. 

“Oh!” Your startled voice echoed across the kitchen at the sight of him. “Oh, it’s just you.”

An eyebrow raised closer to his hairline. “Just me? Who did you think it was?”

You appeared embarrassed for a moment, waving a spatula in the air. “Well, I may or may not have stolen Tony’s top secret models for his next version of the suit—just because I was curious how much he was going to spend on it, you know? I figured he’d come storming in accusing me of theft.”

A smile graced Steve’s lips. “Well, knowing Tony, I don’t think he’ll notice anytime soon. He hasn’t left the lab in hours.”

You shook your head fondly with a part hum, part scoff, before turning back to the stove, mixing the large pot full of red sauce. The air was saturated with the scent of simmering tomatoes and aromatic herbs—basil and oregano, Steve mused, were probably two of his most favorite things since coming out of the ice. They certainly didn’t have flavors like those back in the forties. Everything was far too bland and excessively moist back then. 

“I’m making vegan spaghetti,” you said, snapping him out of his mouth-watering daze. “I’d be happy to fix a plate for you.”

A polite protest was on the tip of his tongue—Steve was planning on quickly microwaving a frozen pizza before heading off to do some more work. Just as he began to voice this, his stomach rumbled loudly in betrayal, and a grimace etched over his mouth. A wave of heat seeped through his skin, tinting his face a subtle shade of scarlet. 

Much to his relief, you merely grinned brightly, smothering a laugh by biting down on your bottom lip in amusement. “I’ll take that as a yes,” you quipped, ladleing spoonfuls of sauce into two bowls of steaming spaghetti noodles. “Take a seat.”

Complying, Steve gingerly sat at the kitchen table, resting his hand atop the smooth glass. “Can I ask you something?”

A smile danced across your mouth. “I believe you just did, Cap.” You chuckled mildly before gesturing for him to carry on.

“If you’ve got powers, why are you…”

“Cooking? I guess I just like to do things organically sometimes,” you replied easily, sprinkling herbs on top of the spaghetti before bringing the steaming bowls towards the table. “It’s cathartic.”

Steve thought to all the times he broke the sandbags in the gym—the satisfying thud of completion. He supposed he understood what you meant.

The dish in front of him was wafting with a fragrance that made his stomach twist painfully with hunger. 

“Dig in,” you said, gesturing to his serving as you started twirling the noodles around with a fork. “And to elaborate on your question, I’ve made food using my powers before—but it just tastes different. Like it isn’t the same if I didn’t measure out the ingredients, waited for the water to boil, or chopped up the veggies. It feels almost as if I’m cheating, you know?”

Steve tilted his head in thought. “That’s an interesting way to put it,” he said with a small smile, before forking some spaghetti into his mouth. “How’d you find out about your powers?”

The light-hearted atmosphere about you seemed to thin away at his question. Your bottom lip was pulled between your teeth as you considered his question for a moment before responding. “It was an accident. A bad one. My ex… he was a real dick—excuse my language—and this one time one of our fights got out of hand. He started raising his palm like he was going to hit me. He wasn’t going to, by the way, he was just reaching for his phone behind me. But I panicked—and all of a sudden a shard of glass materialized right through his hand.”

Steve’s brows rose. He shoveled more spaghetti into his mouth.

“There was blood dripping all over the floor. We were both silent at first. Then, he started screaming. Luckily, we had a first aid kit in our bathroom. I bound his palm and drove him to the hospital—he was fine. No permanent damage.”

You sipped on some water, swallowing heavily.

“Are you guys still…?” 

“Oh, definitely not.” You chuckled bitterly. “He never wanted to speak to me ever again. Called me a freak. A mutant.”

It was brief, but Steve could see the insecurity meld across your features, shattering through your otherwise bubbly persona. 

“Well, he was an idiot. It was an accident, right? Accidents happen,” Steve quietly put forth. “And for what it’s worth, I think your powers are extraordinary. I mean, you can conjure up practically anything you want! That’s just… incredible.”

Warmth stained your insides golden as you pushed away a smile. “Thanks, Steve. Your powers aren’t too bad either—fast healing, enhanced strength. You’re quite the package.”

A generous smattering of crimson spread over his cheekbones. “Well, I’d have to thank Doctor Erskine for that. He was the one that invented the super serum—and chose for me to be the test subject. Because he believed in me.” There was a distant, reminiscent sadness to his eyes. You knew of Erskine, he was plastered across practically every American history textbook. 

“I’m sorry he died so soon,” you mumbled. “He seemed like a great man.”

“He was,” Steve said, nodding. He regarded you for a moment, briefly wondering just why it was so easy to talk to you when the two of you had barely spoken before this. The blonde across from you cleared his throat. “Thinking about him always gets me strangely nostalgic. I dream about the forties sometimes… my terrible childhood, my creaky apartment, my first love, … life before the war—before all of this. Sometimes I wonder—if I was given the chance to go back, would I?”

Your fork stopped halfway to your face. “Would you?” you asked quietly.

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted, rather shamefully. “I don’t think I would. I mean, I’ve got my family here. Bucky, Sam, Natasha—they mean the world to me. I think I just feel… guilty about it all? Like when you mentioned using magic sometimes feels like your cheating at something. I feel like I cheated my own death. It feels unfair. When I look at Bucky—I feel like I betrayed him.”

“Oh, Steve.” You were shaking your head, reaching across the table to gently grasp one of his hands. Your palm was warm atop his frigid one. “I know how that feels—like you don’t deserve a place in the world because you’re different. But I promise it gets better. None of that was your fault. You’ll move on, with time. Plus, you’ve got a great support system here. I know we haven’t been the closest of friends but I’m certainly willing to lend an ear whenever you want me to.”

It mildly surprised him when he felt disappointment unfurl within his chest when you retracted your touch.

“That…” Steve released a small sigh, relaxing his muscles that he didn’t even realize were tense. “That means a lot, Y/N. Thanks. I haven’t really told anybody this because I thought it’d just… go away eventually. I don’t like the quiet. I hate it, in fact. The silence always reminds me of all the time I spent in the ice—how I cheated death. It leaves me with my own thoughts and makes me realize just how… unsatisfied I am. I’m not happy with myself when everything around me is quiet.”

He swallowed down another twirl of spaghetti, now cold and thick in his throat.

A part of him was afraid he’d scare you away with this confession. After all, it was a lot to dump on the first conversation with someone he had a lot of respect for.

Instead of finishing the rest of your spaghetti as quickly as you could and running away from him like Steve partially expected you’d do, you merely smiled at him, a newfound understanding reflected in your eyes. “Then I’ll make sure never to be quiet around you,” you said, genuine tenderness woven between each word.

Steve’s stomach lurched at that.

The rest of the dinner went by filled with stories of how you mastered your powers, stories of Steve finding out Bucky was still alive after all these years, stories of how you met Tony long, long ago.

It was safe to say, silence was nowhere near the two of you that night. 

You were humming again. Steve could hear you from down the hall. It’d been a couple of weeks since that first dinner with you—with dozens more sprinkled in between. The two of you were practically attached by the hip after that. 

A smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

He wandered into the kitchen with his hands behind his back, coming beside you at the sink, where you were washing the dishes (which reminded him that he forgot to remind Tony to fix the dishwasher). 

“Can I help?” he asked, unclasping his hands and extending one towards you.

Without breaking off your humming, you handed him a damp plate whilst gesturing to a rag for him to use to dry. Steve caught sight of your bright grin from his peripheral vision. He ducked his head bashfully, pulse kicking up a notch. Your hip bumped into his, and the two of you quietly chuckled. 

No words were exchanged between the two of you then, the only thing filling the silence between you was your disjointed hums to songs that Steve didn’t know.

“What song are you humming?” The scratching of Steve’s pencil against paper momentarily stopped in the middle of drawing a sketch of a bowl of fruits on the coffee table in front of him as he tentatively asked the question. 

You looked away from your book propped up on your legs, which were carelessly thrown over Steve’s on the compound’s couch. His free hand was splayed largely on your knee—but you pretended not to notice.

“Huh?” you asked, having not heard his question properly, preoccupied with the story you were reading.

“You’re always humming the same song,” Steve said. “Well, parts of that song.”

“Oh!” Placing the book down, you shifted around so you could reach for your phone in your pocket. “It’s this sixties song called Summer Wine by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood. One of my all time favorites.” 

You pressed the play button on your phone screen and Steve listened along, enjoying the softness of Nancy’s voice in stark contrast to the slow rasp of Lee’s. He bobbed his head to the song off-beat, but you found it endearing all the same.

“Yeah, that’s it, old man,” you teased, elbowing him in the side and mimicking his movements. Your smile, so wide it seemed to illuminate the entire room, made Steve giddy with excitement. “It’s a good song, isn’t it?”

Steve let out a breathy chuckle. “You know, I was so set on forties music being the best of the best for the longest time—I think you might just be able to change my mind. Don’t tell Bucky I said that, though—he’d skin me alive.”

A genuine gasp fell from your lungs as you lurched forward, grabbing at his hands and leaning in so close he could see his reflections in your enlivened irises. He could smell your perfume, a soft wafting of vanilla and lavender that made his head spin. “Really? Because I have so many more songs I could recommend to you—tell you what, I’ll make you a playlist tonight. Finally introduce you to the world of modern music.” You relinquished your hold on him, moving back with a grand beam. “That might be the nicest compliment anybody’s ever given me, Stevie.”

Steve couldn’t help but feel like you were overexaggerating just to make him happy, but you seemed happy to do so, and how could he ever interfere with that? 

“I don’t know, though,” Steve started, his tone teasing. “Forties music is gonna be really hard to top.”

“It’ll be my mission to find something for you, then,” you said, determined. With that, you picked your book back up and began reading again, humming softly once more. Steve took that as his cue to continue drawing. 

He spared you a glance every once in a while, observing the way the sunlight from the window cast a dewy, honey-like luminescence over your features. The way the sloping curvatures of the shadows on your face enhanced your relaxed state. The way your teeth sank into the flesh of your bottom lip as your pupils flitted to and fro from the book’s pages. He wanted to ask if he could draw you, but the words lodged in his throat, like he had swallowed a large stone.

So he stayed quiet, listening to you hum a song that Steve now knew.

“Steve.”

Natasha crossed her arms.

“Steve.”

She sighed, eyes narrowing. 

“Damn it, Steve!”

Finally, the blonde startled, ripping his headphones off and whirling around in his chair to see Natasha standing a foot away from his desk. He’d been listening to the playlist you had meticulously curated for him, practically bouncing on the balls of your feet when you told him to listen to it.

The annoyance in the green of her eyes dissipated, replaced with mild amusement. “So much for super-hearing, huh?” she snarked, lacking any true bite to her words. Despite her stoic demeanor, she was really glad Steve found someone that made him happier than anybody else ever did. Even though he didn’t know it yet—Natasha saw the way he looked at you. 

Steve scratched the back of his neck bashfully. “Sorry, Nat. How can I help?”

“Y/N just got back from their mission. They’re in the infirmary.”

Immediately, he stood up, chair squeaking at the abrupt movement, eyebrows furrowing. “Infirmary? Are they hurt? What’re they doing back so early? The mission was supposed to be take an entire week, that’s what—”

“Relax, Rogers,” Natasha sternly asserted, effectively cutting him off. “Just doing a check-up—they were exposed to some radioactive material but it should be fine.” In a much softer tone, she added on, “Y/N was asking for you.”

Breath hitching in his throat, Steve nodded and a quiet thank you left his lips as he jogged out of his room. 

The few minutes of silence as he rushed to the infirmary did nothing good for his worrying. He passed by a pretty bruised-up Clint lounging across the waiting seats, pressing an ice cube to a gash on his forehead, and gestured to the double doors across from him. He knew of Steve’s budding relationship with you (because Natasha made it her personal mission to embarrass the poor guy) and could only assume that he’d come rushing here for you. The polished floors squeaked under his shoes as he came to a sudden halt, briefly saluting Clint thanks before knocking twice. Before he got a response, he slowly pushed the doors open, peeking his head in.

You were seated on the edge of the hospital bed, still in your mission’s attire, hair rumpled and a bit of dried blood on the side of your jaw, but you looked to be otherwise just fine. Doctor Cho was beside you, tapping her pen against a clipboard as she took note of your blood pressure. 

“Hey, old man. Long time no see,” you said with a toothy grin when you heard the door creak open. “You missed the funniest thing on the mission. There was this—”

Steve strode forward, and before you could finish your sentence, he knelt down and enveloped you into a tight embrace, nose pressing against the crown of your head. 

Your words were muffled into his shirt, which eventually died away when you noticed that he clearly was too emotional to listen to your amusing story of how Clint tripped on a big rock and cut his head. He smelled so good, like clean laundry and those tree-scented car fresheners. Steve barely registered Doctor Cho shifting awkwardly and excusing herself out of the room, entirely fixated by the way your arm loosely curled around his shoulders as you hugged him back.

“Whose blood is that?” he asked without pulling away from you.

“Not mine,” you assured him.

“Nat told me you were asking for me,” said the blonde, gingerly pulling away from you to meet your eyes. His hand went under your chin to tilt your head around, as if reaffirming that you were perfectly fine. “Exposed to radioactive material? What happened? Are you hurt?”

“Looks like someone missed me,” you laughed at his mother henning, bringing your hand up to wrap around his, holding it close to your chest. “The wrong kind of people were trying to steal stuff that could potentially be used for biological warfare—we intercepted, but one of the cases broke and I had to use my powers to forge a new one. I was only exposed for a couple seconds, but it was enough to warrant a check up. We had to back off because they were in possession of the last case and threatened to drop it into the city’s main water supply.”

Steve’s brows knitted together as you spoke. “We gotta go stop them, then—”

“They think they have the last case,” you said, a hint of a smile dancing across your lips.

“You used your powers to make a fake,” Steve whispered in realization. “You’re a genius.”

Waving away his praise, you leaned forward, gripping him tighter. “Enough about that! Did you listen to the playlist?”

His chest rumbled as he laughed. You had just gotten back from a dangerous mission and you were asking about him. 

“I was around halfway through,” he said, grinning softly.

“Guess you’ll just have to listen to the rest with me,” you quipped, craning your neck to swiftly kiss his cheek. When you pulled back just a little, you did it ever so slowly, hovering close enough so that your noses brushed against one another. 

Heat flushed across his face. His heart palpitated painfully against his ribcage. His stormy eyes flickered down to glance at your lips, then moved up again to meet your eyes. All he saw was you.

“You can kiss me, Stevie,” you mumbled against him, giving him the green light he was waiting for. “I promise I won’t bite. Unless you’re into that. I mean, you’re a super soldier, would you even feel th—mmh!”

That spurred him to shift forward, capturing your lips with his and effectively interrupting your thoughts before he could get any more flustered, foreheads bumping against one another. After recovering from your initial shock, you tugged him closer by the lapels of his shirt, tilting your head to the side so he could fold into you ever so perfectly. It felt as if a fire was crawling around his veins, consuming him entirely. Your skin was cold against his, quelling the burning sensation dancing over his skin. 

You smiled into the mouth, laughing against his lips when he drifted his fingers up your side. “That tickles,” you murmured, pressing butterfly kisses on the corners of his lips and the tip of his nose. 

Steve couldn’t help it. He began laughing as well, muffled when you slapped his tickling hands away, kissing him harder.

The two of you stayed that way for what felt like hours—breaths turned ragged and chests heaving, when really it was only about five minutes. By the stroke of the sixth minute, Tony strode into the infirmary room uttering, “Knockity knock knock,” despite not knocking.

“Woah!” he exclaimed upon seeing the two of you in such… close proximities. “Took you two long enough. Barnes owes me twenty bucks. And, Jesus, hang a sock on the door, Rogers! I know you’re old, and not at all accustomed to the sexual customs of our generation, but I do not want to see my recently-radiated best friend swap spit with you.”

You rolled your eyes, sticking your tongue out at him. “Nice to see you, too, Tony. And yeah, your recently-radiated friend is just peachy, thanks for asking!”

Tony glared at you. “Please, if you weren’t ‘just peachy’ Rogers wouldn’t be shoving his tongue down your throat.” Steve looked like he wanted to object, but he cleared his throat and diverted his gaze to the floor instead. Tony barked out a laugh, rotating on his heel to head back out. “Good to see you’re okay, kid. Remember to wrap it before you tap it!”

As soon as he was gone, Steve groaned, dropping his head against your chest, flustered beyond relief. 

“Does he always have to be so crass?” he asked, wrinkling his nose with embarrassment. 

“That’s Tony for you.” You shook your head with amusement. Then, your voice a notch softer, you asked, “Hey, Stevie?”

He hummed in response, lifting his head to look at you.

“You remember when you said you weren’t sure if you’d want to go back to the forties or not?”

Steve blinked in mild surprise. “Yeah?”

Your expression betrayed your clear hesitance as you swallowed uncomfortably. “Do you think you’d go now?”

“No, sweetheart,” he whispered, bending closer so his nose brushed yours. “I’d never leave you. Not ever. I wasn’t going to leave in the first place, because I could never leave my friends and family here. But you… you make me feel not guilty for being happy. Like I deserve a life of my own—with you. And I think the quiet becomes more bearable when you’re around me. I don’t think so much of the past with you because… well, because I’m thinking of our future.”

A heartbreakingly bright smile painted your lips golden, and you shook your head fondly. It might’ve just been a trick of the infirmary’s painfully artificial lights, but he could’ve sworn he saw the glimmering film of tears briefly gloss over your eyes. “Did you just come up with that on the spot?” The two of you laughed into each other, and you pressed a gentle kiss just under his eyes. “You’re something else, Stevie, I’ll tell you that.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” he said, unable to stop smiling, before capturing your grin with his once more.