Clint’s apartment had always, inexplicably, carried the faint odor of woodsmoke, of campfires and barbeque smokers. It was in the middle of Queens, four stories above a take-out Pad Thai place with so many health code violations it was miraculous they were still in business, but somehow the smell clung to all of Clint’s threadbare upholstery and dragon’s hoard of blankets and all of his pajamas and towels.
The savory tang was something Naasha had come to look forward to as she paused by the buzzer and found “C. F. Barton” scrawled in a careless hand on the third card from the bottom of the list.
“Clint? It’s Natasha. I know you’re home, you were on the fire escape six minutes ago with that absurd Sesame Street mug and last month’s Car and Driver.”
A minute of silence, a minute and thirty seconds, and Natasha’s thumb was hovering over the small red button when the speaker crackled. “I hate you all,” Clint’s voice said, roughened by sleep or alcohol or tears, Natasha couldn’t tell which. “Go the fuck away.”
“Until such a time as you are found unfit for duty, resign, or are assigned to an agent other than myself,” she said loftily, aiming for more authority than she felt she had any right to have, “I have the right to force my way into your apartment and haul your sorry ass back to SHIELD medical if I see fit.”
Another few beats of silence. His voice was thick in the speaker when he said, “So you’re the poor asshole who got interim custody of Coulson’s agents.”
“All four of you, yes. Until Personnel reassigns you to another handler.”
Natasha waited in silence for another few seconds, shoulder braced against the brick wall. Almost grudgingly, the buzzer vibrated near the door lock, and she grabbed for the handle like he’d change his mind and swept inside.
The door to apartment 204 was cracked open for her, the familiar woodsmoke smell curling out into the hallway. Natasha shut the door behind her and removed her jacket. She glanced around the living room before removing her gun and stashing it under the lid of the blanket chest by the door. “Clint?”
A moan from the couch answered her. Slowly, Clint’s eyes peeked over the back of the couch, his hair sticking up in all directions and in dire need of a trim. She raised an eyebrow. He collapsed again with a muffled whumph.
“You look like shit,” she informed him indelicately, leaning her forearms on the back of the couch.
“I’ve never been Miss America material, what do you want from me,” he muttered resentfully. His arms folded around the top of his head on the amr of the couch. Where his t-shirt sleeves rode up on his shoulders, she could see a latticework of tiny cuts from broken windows, irritated and red.
She reached down and ran her fingertips over his scalp. “You know what I mean. Hill said you weren’t clear to leave until Friday.”
“Agent Hill is a gossiping, bitchy hen with a superiority complex,” Clint said darkly into the upholstery. “And I feel fine.”
“Bullshit,” Natasha countered swiftly, fingers tightening in his hair. “You hate Car and Driver, you only steal it from your downstairs neighbor to piss him off, and you only actually read the damn things when you’re trying to distract yourself.”
Clint rolled off the couch and out of her reach, flipping her off as he grabbed his Sesame Street mug and stumbled to the kitchen. “So I got bored, sue me. Can’t exactly go check out a book from the library with a SHIELD tac van parked down the street.”
Natasha sighed. She knew he’d bring that up. “I checked with their agent in charge, they’re monitoring utilities to make sure there’s no damage to the lines as a result of the invasion. No surveillance, calm down.”
“Sure. I’ll calm down when they get the fuck away from my building.”
“Alright, fine. Don’t believe me, see if I care.”
For some reason, the reverse psychology in “If she’s lying to me, she’ll try harder to convince me that she’s telling the truth” always worked with Clint. His shoulders went slack, and he reached for the coffee pot with a tired sigh. “How’s...everyone?”
The question was a field full of landmines, and judging by Clint’s furtive glance over his shoulder, he meant it to be just that. Can’t just make my life easy here, can you, Natasha thought with no small amount of fondness. “Stark asked about you yesterday,” she started.
“No shit. He talked to you? Willingly?”
“Mm. Called my personal number. I was at the gym at the time, which didn’t win him any points over here, but...” She shrugged. “Said to tell you he’s working on some new arrow designs for you, ‘better than anything those SHIELD assholes can come up with’ - his words, not mine. He seemed...well, manic, if we’re being honest, but that’s Tony Stark’s version of enthusiastic, so I didn’t try to dissuade him.”
Clint chuckled dryly, and nearly choked on it. “He’s crazy.”
“For doing it with everything else he’s got going on right now? Absolutely. For wanting to do it at all? I don’t think so.” Natasha settled herself in the arm chair COulson had procured from God-only-knew-where after Clint had suffered a disasterous severe-concussion-eight-cracked-ribs-and-two-fractured-vertebrae fall off a bridge and still refused to stay put until the doctors gave him the all-clear to go home. “If I were you, I’d keep my mouth shut and let him make me all the toys he wanted.”
Clint shrugged noncommittally and dropped an obscene amount of sugar in his mug before padding back over to the couch.
Natasha clicked her tongue. “And you didn’t think to offer me any? Manners, Barton, have you learned nothing?”
“Okay, A, you have a drawer, you are no longer a guest and can get your own damn coffee if you want. Two, as you’re so enthusiastic about reminding me, I am trailer trash and I have no idea how your expectations of me got so damn high. And lastly, this is third-day reheat coffee, I knew you wouldn’t be interested and so I didn’t even bother.”
She grabbed his mug from him and took an experimental sip. “Clint,” she grimaced, “this is not coffee. I’m pretty sure this falls somewhere between biohazard and nuclear waste. I’m making a fresh pot, this is ridiculous.”
“What-- No, Tash, you can’t just dump-- Aw, c’mon, that’s wasteful, it’s stil good, don’t--”
She poured the cup and the rest of the pot down the drain, heedless of his protests. “If you’re going to be self-medicating, at least make it fresh.”
Clint sulked, but watched her move around the kitchen without comment. “Why are you here,” he asked finally.
“Because you’re here,” she said, after a moment’s deliberation. “You left, and I know you, Clint. I couldn’t just leave you to work this out by yourself. That’s like letting a twelve year old set his own broken leg. More likely than not, you’re going to heal wrong, and then someone’s just going to have to break it all over again and set it right, and that’s not fun for any of us.”
“I’m glad you have that much faith in my emotional maturity,” he grumbled, shying away from the knowledge that she was probably right. He huddled into his monstrosity of a stretched-out hoodie and tried to focus on something other than how miserable he felt.
She frowned sympathetically and closed the distance between them, resting her palms on the curve of either side of his jaw. “Don’t twist my words,” she reprimanded gently. “I love you, you asshole, and yeah, we’re both kind of fucked over right now. But we can be fucked over together, right? Safety in numbers?”
Clint leaned forward to rest his forehead against hers. “You know they’re probably going to cut me loose, right? I’m a liability - more of a liability than I have been, anyway. Mind control or not, I’m still a war criminal.”
“SHIELD won’t let you hang like that. And if they do, I’ll be right behind you. You’re stuck with me, Clint, like it or not.” She wrapped her arms around his neck and felt his stubble scratch along the side of her neck. His arms folded around her back, and he took a raw, ragged-sounding breath. “Shhh,” she exhaled into his ear. His shoulders were trembling, and the collar of her t-shirt was slightly damp. “Shhhh, we’re okay. Everything’s okay.”