Be Calm

"I'm a sweet, little love maker..."

Nicole Martinez smirked as she listened to the "Pendulum" by FKA twigs that came up on Pandora, adjusting her hearing aids so she could hear it clearer. Today was her day off from her work as a SHIELD medical secretary. Dr. Ellington, the doctor placed in charge after Dr. Cho's run in with Ultron that left her out-of-commission for the next few months, was adamant about her staff getting vacation time, claiming that they deserved rest more than anyone else. Nicole begged to differ, knowing that the Avengers, of all people, needed time off. They had a lot of shit they had to sort through after the debacle of the year before where Captain America and Iron Man almost tore the team apart. Things were still tentative at best with them.

"Turn that shit off. Why do you always have to play your music without headphones? Fuck, you know that gets on my nerves, so why do you..."

With a small sigh, Nicole looked up at her boyfriend of the past three years. She wondered what had ever made her fall in love with Mateo. He was good-looking, yeah, but what else was there? He had a job, but it wasn't like he ever helped out with the bills anymore. He just took her to restaurants every once in a while to make it seem like he was putting in more effort into the relationship than he truly was. It was irritating, really, how he tried to hold that over her until she felt guilt for bringing up the lack of support.

Mami always did say ello es un chichi, Nicole thought to herself, trying not to smirk. Mateo did act like a child. She should have listened to her mother.

What the fuck are you smirking at?" Mateo snapped, brown eyes glaring down at Nicole as he stood so close she felt he was trying to suffocate her with his presence. He had a temper that made many of his enemies cower in fear. When it was paired up with his SHIELD uniform, the agent was truly walking darkness, primed to attack and kill whoever looked at him funny. Nicole used to find it hot how dominant he was - until he brought his attitude home to her.

"Nothing." As long as Mateo continued to act like a monster, he would always be nothing. A man who knew that there was a time and place for his wrath was a strong man. Men like Mateo threw tantrums when things didn't go their way. One day, someone would pop him in his jaw for being a pariguayo.

Fools died viciously on the battlefield.

Deciding that she was no longer worth his attention, Mateo turned away from Nicole and muttered about going on a mission for the next two or three days. He began to dig through the drawers and pull out his clothes, tossing them on the bed where Nicole was positioned. She scooted away from the middle, avoiding the flying articles of clothing with annoyance. Nicole knew he expected her to be there when he came back, dinner on the table and ready for him to rut on top of her to his heart's content.

Fuck that, pal. She turned her hearing aids off, angling her body away from the man she no longer loved. If he was to ignore her, she would do the same. It wasn't like he ever wanted to have her engage in the conversation. That'd be absurd! His voice sounded like honey to himself.

~*~*~*~*~*~

She was mad. That was to be expected, yeah, but he had just as much of a reason to be furious too. The anger between them was mutual, not capable of being exclusive to only one party. Bruce left her when they had so much shared between them - stuff an agent like Natasha didn't share with reckless abandon. Natasha forced him to fight when all he wanted was to leave, to be with her and live and actual life.

They both hurt each other.

Well, actually, she hurt him more now considering the well placed punch to his cheek she just delivered.

"There," she grit out, smiling viciously, "Now, we are even."

Bruce did not know how the hit made them even, but he would take it. As long as he could just be here, with his chosen family, and not have to worry about having his throat slit in his sleep because Natasha chose to be a hypocrite. "Okay," he heaved out, trying to calm his heart rate before he was forced by Nat, again, into turning into The Other Guy. "Fair enough."

Sensing that now was the perfect time to swoop in, Clint appeared at Natasha's side, ushering her away from Bruce and to the elevator so she wouldn't do anymore damage to the doctor. "Nice to have you back, Doc!" the bowman called over his shoulder, his tone sincere. Even though he was currently with Bruce's ex, Clint wasn't the type to become jealous of a reappearance by an old flame. He was too secure in his knowledge that Natasha would never play with his emotions. They'd always been far too close for that type of betrayal to occur.

"You too!" What? He missed the archer. Clint was one of the most calm of the bunch around here, and that was something Bruce always appreciated, a calm and secure person to tether himself to when his rage elevated to a level he couldn't control on his own.

"Damn!" Tony exclaimed as soon as the two assassins were out of sight, rushing to his friend's side with a wild grin. "She clocked you!"

"I know. I felt it."

"It's great to have you back, Big Guy! I can finally talk to someone who knows English. Doc El isn't as sweet as you most days. You ought to hear some of the words she had for Bucket when he used to walk in all busted up. Buck-a-roo sure as hell got an earful!"

Bruce didn't miss the purposeful avoidance of calling Bucky by his name. He went into hiding, but that didn't mean he stopped watching the news. The two were still working on trying to not shout violent, insulting and hateful things when in the same room, Bruce figured. "Hmm? Doc El?" Tony only ever really made sense to Bruce when talking science.

"Oh, she's the replacement for Dr. Cho..." Tony said, his eyes moving from Bruce's and to the tablet in his hands. He tapped on the screen a couple times before pulling up a picture of a pretty woman with a hairstyle that reminded Bruce of a Suburban Frankenstein's wife. It was a bob cut with a streak of white in the jet black hair, and that was just typical. SHIELD replaced average people with the more eccentric - they tended to live longer for some reason. "Pretty, isn't she? But, don't look too hard. Bang-for-your-Buck is in love with her. She, on the other hand, is pissed about him taking a catnap with T'Challa in Wakanda for the past three months."

"What?"

"Oh, Buck-off did three months in cryo - a choice he made on his own - and Doc El, as the wonderful, intelligent, hot -"

"Pepper like you talking about other girls like that?" Bruce joked, giving a half-smile to his close friend. It didn't have the desired affect. Tony's gaze shot to Bruce, eyes sad even though he gave a forced smile back.

"We're having a bit of a rough patch. The two of his are taking some time and working on ourselves. It's no one's fault."

Bruce wondered how much had changed while he was gone.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"Knock, knock!" Morgan Golden, a fellow desk worker in SHIELD, called as she banged on Nicole's front door. She was hoping her friend hadn't turned off her hearing aids and could hear her whacking her fist against the door like a maniac. "Yo, open up! I'm fuckin' cold! It's October!"

Nicole laughed as she moved away from the box she was packing the living room, racing to her front door. She flung it open and greeted Morgan with the biggest hug a friend could. "Morgan! Help me pack up my pictures. If I'm in it, I want it. I'll just cut the stupid man out later." She waved to the boxes and the walls of her house as she led her friend in. During the fight between the Avengers, Dr. Ellington was snappy and scared the shit out of her nurses, especially during Colonel Rhodes' rehab. She didn't want to take sides and Sargent Barnes went under the radar with nothing but a note to her stating he would need to stay away for a while and that he loved her. In order to cope with the understandable sourness of her boss, Nicole set about trying to make friends in other department to keep from the gossip she knew Dr. Ellington was bound to hear about and confront her staff on.

Morgan was just rushing through the halls, files about the UN and the Avengers in her arms, when she tripped. Nicole, being a nice person, helped her pick everything up. It wasn't until she looked up at Morgan and noticed the other woman was speaking that she signed, "Sorry," before turning her hearing aids on. The Avengers HQ was much better to walk around when you didn't hear the strange echo of instructors bossing around the new agents, helicopters being taken out for a spin by Agent Romanov and Tony Stark blowing something up for therapeutic reasons.

"You're deaf?" Morgan asked, making sure to talk at a normal pace in case her guess was right. It was a question every hearing person Nicole met asked.

"Only when I can't hear."

They laughed together at the joke, and introduced themselves. A new friendship was made quickly and easily, something Nicole never thought would be possible. Most people took a long time to warm up to her. Many didn't have the patience to hold up a long conversation with someone who could miss chunks of it just by looking away for a second.

Now, Morgan and Nicole were inseparable. Practically attached at the hip when not on duty.

Nicole taught Morgan sign language, which she claimed she would use when, "Clint Barton and the rest of those assholes come home." And she did.

Morgan taught Nicole that her boyfriend shouldn't, "Think he could freaking talk to you like that, 'cause you deserve better than ol' Motor-mouth." And she did.

The two friends set about pack up all of Nicole's clothing, pictures, knitting and anything they thought Mateo didn't deserve to keep. When Mittens, the black and white cat Nicole got two years ago in the hopes of softening up Mateo (people became more responsible when they had pets, right? Wrong), rubbed up against Morgan and Nicole's legs for the hundredth time, it was an easy choice to take him with her. Mateo would let Mittens starve. He had proved by the rough shoving of her beloved cat in the past that he had no paternal bone in his body.

Even Mittens could see that. He was practically begging for his Mami to take him with her!

"Stark let me borrow one of his few trucks," Morgan told her friend, smiling at her. She was proud of Nicole for taking the big leap she needed in order to get away from The Bastard Who Shall Not Be Named. "Says I am like family."

"You should be afraid," Nicole quipped, adjusting her hearing aids. These ones were starting to glitch on her. She'd need to see Dr. Ellington about new ones when she got back to work.

"Oh, hush! Let's get going. Thor's coming by tonight, Nikki. He wants to welcome you to our humble space in what Tony calls the Avengers Mansion. Honestly, I think he's just trying to keep everybody together. I mean, that's why I stay there, since he doesn't want Thor to run off just to see me." Morgan was a little chatterbox most days, but she was nowhere near Mateo. Even now, she proved that by looking to Nicole to see if she had anything to say about the matter.

Glad to have a place away from her verbally abusive boyfriend, Nicole told her, "That's pretty nice. It's going to be fun to meet the Avengers when they aren't bleeding out."