A/N: I am currently working on five or so requests from you lovely people! They'll all be up really soon, I've already started mapping them all out! Just got to finish organizing them on paper :)

ALSO does anyone know if Wattpad has a chapter limit?? I'm getting really high up in chapters and would hate for it to stop me without me getting the chance to wrap things up... should I make a second book if there's a limit? What do you all think?

Lots of love! You guys are seriously the best.

Winnie

PS LOOK AT THAT PERFECT BODY UP THERE IN THAT GIF!!

Those hips don't lie. YOU MAKE A WOMAN GO MAD, STEVE. (Now I have Shakira stuck in my head).

Words: 3.7K

You clamber out of the yellow taxi cab into the rain. The New York sky sheds a layer of moisture onto the top of your head while you juggle three paper sacks of groceries. The doorman is too busy to help you into the elevator so you make the venture alone. As soon as you've ridden to your floor, the fifth, someone tall and masculine smelling is standing in your way.

"Oh," you gasp when you see him. "Didn't expect to see you there, Steve."

Your ridiculously attractive neighbor with the tufts of blond hair smiles kindly. "Need a hand?"

Before you can even respond, Steve's grabbing two of the sacks. "Thanks," you laugh lightly, "You always seem to be around just when I need you, Steve." You begin to walk down the hall with Steve beside you.

Steve's eyes, which are the color of denim jeans, flicker to your feet. He lifts them again with a tight-lipped smile. "Fortunate timing, I guess."

"I guess so." You stop outside of your apartment. The keys that dangle from your lanyard unlock the door. There are four keys on this lanyard: one for the door, one for your safe, one for the mailbox, and the last... you're not sure. It's always been here, as long as you can remember, but you can't quite recall what the gold key unlocks.

"Come on in," you tell Steve. You kick open the door and the man follows you on soft feet into the living space. He walks behind you to the kitchen where he's been a couple times before: usually to help you unload groceries or lift something heavy.

"Here?" Steve gestures to a rare empty spot on the counter. There are tea cups and coffee mugs everywhere.

"Sure," you reply. You drop your goods onto the floor and wipe off your hands of the little paper particles. "Thanks again for the help."

"No problem at all," Steve replies casually. He stands back, watching you beginning to unload the purchases, with a quiet expression of thoughtfulness on his face. "I'm always just next door if you need me."

You pause, apple sack in your clutch, and smile back at him. What a lucky world this is for you to housed next to the kindest, gentlest human in existence. "Thanks, Steve. Same goes for you. I may not be strong or coordinated, but I'm a pretty decent cook."

Steve chuckles lightly. "Oh I know."

You pause before putting the milk jug into the fridge. "You do?"

Steve blinks. "I just mean—I've smelled it before. Your cooking, I mean. And I've—I've seen the food magazines you get delivered. They accidentally got sent to my address one time, I think."

"Oh, well, next time you smell something good don't hesitate to come over. I'm always alone."

Steve, sensing that he's still welcomed, steps over to help you in putting food away. He continues the conversation by asking, "You don't have any family in the area?" The slight draft from the cracked window has his aftershave fluttering towards your face. He smells crisp and clean.

You shake your head. "No. Not that I know of," you say. "I was in the system until I was eighteen. I tried to find them for years, but they're nowhere."

"Is that how you ended up in the city?"

"I think so," you respond with a light laugh. "Honestly, sometimes it all feels so hard to remember."

Steve nods like he understands. His pretty pink lips are pursed closed. "I'm sorry you didn't find them."

"It's okay." You shove another blue box of macaroni and cheese into the crowded cupboard. "It's hard to know what you're missing out on if you don't remember what you had, you know? It'd be worse if I remembered and had something to miss."

Steve's smile is almost sad, you think. "Believe me; I know exactly what you mean."

You reach into the last grocery sack to find that everything's been put away. "Well, that looks like the end of it." You look up from crumbling the bag to see Steve leaning in the direction of the door. "You want to stay for dinner? I thought about making spaghetti."

"No, no. That's alright—I'll leave you in peace tonight," he chuckles awkwardly. "I've got a thing to do tonight, anyway."

"Oh really?" you raise an eyebrow. "Is it a date?" you tease.

Steve flushes red. "What? No! No, I'm not..."

"I'm just messing with you," you laugh lightly. You walk towards him and squeeze his shoulder as you pass. "Relax, soldier."

"Soldier?" Steve repeats. He seems shocked—no, startled even—to have heard you thoughtlessly use this nickname. You wonder momentarily if you've offended him somehow, or maybe even subconsciously turned him on, when you see the way his eyes are bulging out of his head.

"Sorry, just sort of came out of my mouth on its own." You shrug it off.

Steve shakes his head and manages a tight laugh. "Right, right. Funny." He doesn't seem too amused though, just tense. "Anyway I should probably..." he sort of backs up towards the door—almost knocking over a vase of fake sunflowers on his way. "Sorry, sorry."

"It's okay, Steve. Really. And thanks for the help today," you say with a smile as he steps into the hall.

"Of course. Any time." One last time he blinds you with that pearly white smile. "Good night, Y/N."

"You too, Steve."

You close the door. Staring wistfully at the wood on the other side, you can't help but feel the butterflies start to rear their heads—fluttering your tummy with their obnoxious wings. Despite how awkward and red-cheeked he seems to be, Steve's also a gentleman. And for some odd reason you have a deep-down feeling that he's not as awkward and nervous as his outside sometimes makes him look to be.

Shrugging the thought away, you turn back towards your kitchen to start cooking for the evening.

The pasta-salad combo you've got planned takes practically no time to whip up. You've got plenty of extra evening to do some laundry, vacuum the dirty floors, and put away the clean dishes from the night before. Then, after a few episodes of your favorite TV show, you crawl into bed in your comfiest PJs. There's nothing different about tonight in any way: not even the appearance of your neighbor Steve seems out of the ordinary.

But your dreams beg to differ.

It begins in a forest. You're running. You can almost feel the mulch beneath your feet. If you focus hard enough, the smells come to life: pine and moss mixing with the last night's rain. Then, mingled in with the perfumes of the forest, are the smells of a more sinister side of the world: war. Smoke tickles both of your nostrils and gathers at the back of your throat. You cough and keep running—legs sore beneath the ridiculously tight pants you wear.

It's almost dawn. You can feel the warmth of the rising sun on the back of your neck. Your short hair, pulled away by clips, stays out of your sticky face as you run. But soon the path beneath your feet disappears completely. Here, at the edge of the woods, is a jarring crevice in the earth. Yards away there's the other side—separated by a jagged cliff that leads down to roaring rapids below. The water lunges up towards you—barely scraping up a quarter of the way against the cavernous ravine.

Your eyes dart down towards your hands. You hadn't even realized you'd been holding something all this time. There, in your tight grasp, is a padded envelope. It's got something hard and small inside and doesn't take you opening up to realize it's a flash-drive of some type.

Whirring noises from the sky combine with the roaring of tires. It's not a moment later that you're surrounded on all sides by big black rigs and rifles pointed your way. They're screaming at you to put your hands in the air. You don't think they're speaking English, but you understand what it is that they're saying.

You've still got the package in one hand. All eyes, the two dozen men surrounding you, stare right at it. You know these men are bad. They can't get this... they can never see what's on this drive. So, before you can think twice, you chuck it behind you into the ravine. It plops into the water where the water soaks up into the package and sinks the thing to the bottom of the current. If it's findable, it's certainly not going to be easy to salvage.

There's only one man opposite of you that is without a gun. He's clearly in charge. His face is foggy. You can't make out any of his features, but his voice is clear as he says, "Doesn't matter. She's seen everything. She'll give us what we need."

It's all you need to hear to know that their plans are to take you and torture the information out of you. While still unsure what's going on way at the back of your mind, your outer self seems convinced that there's only one thing left to do.

Throw yourself off the side of the cliff.

You're filled with the eerie, chilling knowledge that when you hit the rocky bottom you're going to die. When the impact occurs, your eyes shoot open wide.

You sit up in bed—gasping and sweaty.

"Hey, babe. You okay?"

The voice doesn't startle you. Just like before, you seem to be watching everything like a movie from behind your eyes. You have no control over anything as you say, "I'm—I'm fine. Just a bad dream."

The darkness of the room fades away with the clicking of a lamp. The room is flooded with light: your room. The same pictures on the walls, the same color. Only this time, it's being shared with your neighbor Steve.

Steve's shirtless with dark circles under his eyes as he props up against the headboard. There's a quiet, tender look to his sunken blue eyes as he grabs your wrist and gently pulls you closer. A sort of sigh flitters out of your mouth as you roll up into his lap and feel his fingers begin to comb your hair. You know he's tired—he certainly looks it—but he stays awake and comforting you until you fall asleep once more.

This time when you open your eyes you're on a couch. You blink, feeling very strange about the realness of the leather beneath your cheek, and rub your face.

"Ah—there she is. Sleeping Beauty decided to wake up from her nap."

You shake out your hair and find, to your surprise, that it's short—just like it was in that dream from before. The man who's just spoken to you is sitting on the chair closest to the TV. There's a football game playing.

"I hate football," you say aloud without meaning to, "Probably why I fell asleep."

The man chuckles. He turns his head and you don't know who he is, but at the same time you do. He's short, built rather nicely, with a dark goatee and peppered black hair. "Well, I hate watching you and Cap walk around making bedroom eyes at each other, but you don't see me falling asleep."

"That insult didn't even make any sense, Stark." You laugh and sit up—stretching your arms above your head. It's when you look down at yourself that you see you've got washboard abs and thick, muscular thighs. You blink stupidly before your attention darts up to the doorway.

There he is again: your neighbor Steve. Only this time, you forget he's your neighbor. His pretty blue eyes meet yours and all you see is his smile. His smile... you love his smile. You love his laugh. You love his lips. You love his voice...

"There you are. I thought we were supposed to go on a run?" Steve asks. He's carrying two water bottles, one orange and the other red, and you know that one of them belongs to you. It's the orange one. His is red. He loves the color red. It reminds him of Christmas.

Why the hell do you know this?

"I fell asleep because Stark is so boring," you reply. You sit up from the couch with stiff limbs. "Damn, I really do need to go on a run." You lean over to stretch out your legs. When you pull back up, the scene has totally changed. Now you're in a dark alley wearing black clothes head-to-toe and a weird plug in your left ear.

"You see anything, Y/N?"

"Besides Wilson's fat ass blocking my view? Nothing." You scoff at your own joke as you peer around the corner onto the street.

The voice on the line chuckles. "Pay attention, Y/N."

"Easy, soldier. I know what I'm doing. This isn't my first rodeo."

Steve, as you recognize his warm voice to be, sighs, "Just be careful out there."

"I always am."

"No, you're not."

"Can you two lovebirds stop bickering before I puke?" a woman's voice steps in.

"Sorry, Nat." You reach to your belt where you're not surprised to feel a hidden gun. "I'm going in now. No one talk to me."

"Be careful," Steve repeats again. "I love you."

You only smile as you step out of the dark alley—the blackness fading away into blinding white light.

You wake up from the dream with a start. Your hands frantically pat along your body to find it exactly the same as it was when you fell asleep. Somehow, the version of yourself in your dreams made more sense than your form does now. You're softer—smaller. You feel frail. In your dreams you'd been so... strong.

You shake your head. It was a dream, that's all. A weird one: especially with the addition of Steve. You excuse it as the garlic from dinner not settling well and try to lay back down. But time passes and you're far away from sleep—farther away than any point during your day today. You run your fingers through your hair, unable to relax. Something about that dream was very unsettling. It's the feelings you're growing for Steve—you know it. They are much too strong and much too fast-growing, like weeds, to be contained. It doesn't make any sense. You look into his beautiful blue eyes and it's like you love him. Of course you don't: that'd be silly. You've only known him for... for... for months, if you remember right. Wait: when did you move into this apartment anyway? You scratch your neck as you try to hazily recall. It seems so long ago...

Dazed, tired, and confused you decide to grab a glass of cold drinking water. You stumble out of bed with the blankets wrapped around your shoulders like a cape. The fabric traipses on the ground behind you—making soothing whirring noises against the hardwood with each sweaty step you take.

Halfway to the kitchen you hear something strange: the sound of ripping thread. Curious, you stop. That's when you realize the tug on the corner ends of the silk sheets you hold. You turn back to see what piece of furniture you've been snagged on.

You come to find that it's not fabric at all: it's a piece of the flooring. The plank here is slightly chipped at one corner: turned up and reaching out with splintering fingers for your delicate silk blanket. You give the fabric a tug and turn back towards the kitchen.

But something stops you.

You can't describe what it is: just that it is. It is there. It is real. It is scary. It is churning in the pit of your belly.

It is the floor board calling you closer.

You draw nearer on timid feet until you're positioned properly to turn on the closest lamp. Light floods the scene and warms your widened pupils. You drop the blankets and shuffle onto your knees. Curiously you regard the floorboard. Skeptical as to what it is that you're feeling, you pause before breathing. Then you let out a breath and knob your fingernail under the notch in the plank. It's loose: just like you thought it'd be. It's easy to pull up. Flooring boards are not supposed to be pulled away, yet this was miraculously easy... almost as if it'd been on purpose.

There's something down here: it's a box.

You pick it up carefully. It's not as heavy as you thought it would be. The box itself is steel but the padlock is gold.

Just like your golden key.

You scramble to your feet. You nearly slip and fall as the silk bedding gets caught underneath you. You manage your way towards the door where your keys sit lonesome in a dish. Your hands tremble as you search the ring for that strange key. Despite months of not knowing what it's belonged to, you've been unable to throw it away.

Why the hell do you have a key that belongs to a box you've never seen?

Back on your knees you carefully set the box in front of you. Wrapped in the blankets again you carefully pry open the lock. The satisfying clicking noise it makes is the loudest thing in the room outside of your heartbeat.

The box is no larger than an envelope. Inside, not surprising considering the size, is a piece of paper. It's folded up atop a few other odd things that you ignore for the time being. Right now you're interested only in the paper: which, as you come to realize, is a note. It's a note in your handwriting. Unmistakable your scratchy cursive is, especially in the color of your favorite pen.

"If something bad ever happens to me," is how the letter begins. Your eyebrows furl as you read further this letter you have no recollection of drafting. "If something ever happens to me, I want you to know that I've always loved you. Even when it may have seemed like you were the least important thing in my life, you were always the one. I'm sorry I took so long to admit to myself that it was you: it was always you. But I know now that whatever time we have together on this earth is going to be worth it. I hope we spend the rest of our lives together: watching stupid comedies while you paint my toenails, but I know that in this world of ours it's highly unlikely that things will go the way we plan. So that's why today, on the day that you've asked me to marry you, I'm writing you a letter. I'm writing you to let you know that no matter what happens to me, I want you to remember the life we had together was everything we deserved. It was beautiful. Every silly fight we had about dirty dishes left in the sink, every night we spent sitting on the windowsill naming our favorite stars, every conversation that ended with laughter or thoughtful tears, every nose-kiss and goodbye hug, every moment we've had together has made everything else worth it. Remember it, darling, and remember that I want you to be happy without me. Remember that I'll always love you."

And that's where it ends. There's nothing more on that flimsy piece of paper. But to you... it seems to stretch on forever. The words twist round and round in your mind until it becomes a loop of grainy film that you're watching on repeat. You see bare toes brushing beneath sheets. You see tears staining cheeks. You see someone's blue eyes in front of yours—crinkled around the brows with lines from wide grins.

You see your life with Steve.

The letter falls from your hands. The first thing you do is reach for your own hand. Your left one, where there once was a ring, is now cold. How could you have forgotten? You'd worn it for months... he'd given it to you on a rainy Sunday in the Netherlands...

Tears blur your eyes as you glance around the room. Everything is so clear now. Those dreams—they weren't dreams at all. This life, this one that you've been living for months now, is the make-believe thing. The cliff, the chase... it was all real. It's the last thing you can remember before showing up here. The fall from the cliff is what took all of the wonderful memories from you. It's what led you to forget the things in your life you love the most.

You can hardly stand up on your feet. The world is rocky. It's like you're trying to keep yourself from hurling on the deck of a lopsided boat. Your head spins, your stomach churns, and your eyes are blurred with saltwater. You manage to steady yourself on the kitchen counter. Sweat dribbles down your forehead.

You forgot everything. But now you remember.

Steve.

The blanket is thrown back behind you as you dash towards the front door. The bolt you've clicked shut is hard to open in your mindless frenzy, but eventually you manage to pry it open and stumble into the hall. Stepping out here since remembering life before is strange. The apartment next door never belonged to Steve. It'd been empty for ages. The only thing that makes sense in this moment as an explanation is to say that he moved in here to watch over you: the woman who he fell in love with who'd forgotten that she felt the same.

You try to pry open his door but find it locked. Feverishly, because you can't wait any longer to consciously see his face, you pound on the wood. It's like you've just come out of some sort of conscious-comatose. You've been here, but not really. You want to see Steve: your Steve. You want to let him know that you remember.

You're still desperately pounding your raw, sore palm against the door when it swings open. Steve's there in his pajamas and messy bed-head. The moment he looks into your tear-brimmed eyes he takes in a sharp breath. It's as if he only needs a single glance into your pupils to know that you're back.

"You..." he pauses there, almost fearfully. His voice trembles. "You remember me." It's less of a question than a hopeful statement.

Through tears you manage to smile. Your head nods as you struggle to form words—only choking on a sob as your head bobs. Steve begins to cry as well. He rushes forward just as the first of his own tears begin to fall. His bare arms squeeze around your tender frame with fragile fierceness as he struggles to hold himself together while keeping you close to his chest. "I love you, I love you," he keeps repeating into your hair. His hands smother over every inch of your skin as he holds you tighter.

It was gone for a while. The memories had been forced from your mind for a short while, but in the end it was your own declaration of love for Steve that prompted you into remembering again. And now, as you stand out in the musky hallway with your husband's hands in your hair and his face pressed into your neck, you close your eyes and will yourself to never lose this again. Because a love like this is simply unforgettable.