The nausea that overcame you as your feet landed back on solid ground was overpowering. Bruce had said that it would come but you didn't expect it to feel quite as bad as it did but then again time travel was a taxing thing to do. Your body ached from overuse and you could feel the tiredness between your eyes. The last five years had been rough and to say you were out of practice was putting it lightly, especially when you have to fight your past self who is definitely much fitter than you ever remember being. But even in your depleted state, you can’t help the small smile that creeps up on your face. You had done it. You were going to bring everyone back and then maybe just maybe you can retire and relax for a minute Thoughts of the future swarmed in your mind. Thoughts of open fields and a warm bed, thoughts of green eyes and auburn hair. Thoughts of kisses shared under stars and of limbs tangled together in the mornings. You turned to face Natasha hoping to share the moment with the woman who would make these thoughts a reality. But it wasn’t her warm green eyes that met yours as you had been expecting. Instead, your eyes locked with steely blue eyes glistening with fresh tears. Your heart dropped. Your eyes searched his, searching for the punchline to the joke you weren't understanding. But the punchline never came and you could feel the dread settle in the bottom of your stomach as you watched the tears fall down Clint’s face.
“ Where’s Nat?” Bruce asked.
You stood still, as still as you have ever stood, waiting for the response. Waiting. Hoping. Hoping that this was all just your imagination, that Nat would pop out from somewhere and wrap her arms around your middle, hugging you into her body. That she would appear with that smirk of hers and prove that sickening feeling in your gut wrong. But with every passing second you knew, you knew that that feeling was right. You could feel that she was gone and that she would never be coming back.
See you in a minute. That’s what she had said to you just moments before you went your separate ways. Before you went on your separate missions. Before you would never see her again. See you in a minute. She had smiled at you, squeezed your arm, and reassured you that it would all be okay like she always did. See you in a minute. There had been a worry behind her eyes, something you had gotten so good at recognising, a look you knew all too well. But you had done nothing to free that look from her eyes. You had done nothing to reassure her back. See you in a minute. You wish you had said something to her, held her close, and stroked her hair as you did when she woke in the night drenched in sweat. Or kissed her temple like you did after a particularly long and tiring mission. But you hadn’t, you had just smiled back. You had just smiled. See you in a minute. And now you would never get to run your hand through her hair or wake her gently when she had fallen asleep on you after a movie she had deemed boring. You would never get to bury your head into the crook of her neck and breathe in her scent. The scent that you wake up to every morning and go to sleep to every night. You would never get to hold her hand or feel her soft skin underneath yours. You would never get to hear her laugh or see her roll her eyes. You would never get to hear her voice ever again. That was all gone. She was gone. And you had just smiled.
You felt helpless in that moment, like time had stopped and would never start again. You felt like an empty shell that someone had forgotten to fill with a person. You felt like you had just lost the very thing that held you together, that made your clock tick. Your legs buckled from beneath you, the muscles no longer wanting to hold up your body. Your body went numb, like the nerves had given up on feeling, like the life force that drove you was being pulled from your body stopping every process that kept you alive from working. Like you were dying. You could feel the tears beginning to stain your cheeks, the saltiness of them welcome as they rolled over your lips. You wanted to scream, you wanted to run and never stop, you wanted to rip out all your insides until there was nothing left. You wanted to do anything to stop the burning that you felt within your chest. The burning felt as though it would tear a hole in the fabric of the universe, it felt like it was going to burn a hole right through your body and only stop when it had consumed every fiber of your being. It hurt. It burned. But you didn’t care, you couldn’t care, your mind was somewhere else, somewhere on a cold unknown planet where the love of your life had met her end. Where she would forever lay, unmoving, without you.
After Tony’s funeral, you couldn’t even bring yourself to get out of bed. The sadness that overcame you weighed you to the soft fabric that lay beneath you. People occasionally visited, their words falling on deaf ears. Their offerings of food lay neatly on the bedside table, untouched by your hands. You had thought about eating, had thought about getting out of bed but when you tried you felt as though you couldn’t move an inch. You allowed your mind to drift off as you lay there, to dreams of a better place. And as you lay there with your eyes closed, you allowed yourself to believe it, so that even if just for a moment the burning that you felt would subside. You dreamt of soft hands weaving their way through your hair. You dreamt of her voice, slightly gravely from sleep whispering sweet words into your ears. You dreamt of green eyes staring into yours. You dreamt of her warm body pressing against your back and her strong arms wrapped around you tucking you further into her. You dreamt of her soft lips pressing softly onto your temple and trailing down the side of your neck before settling on your shoulder. It felt so real, her touch, her warmth. It brought another bout of fresh tears to your eyes that fell onto the pillows.
You knew that when you met Natasha that she would be the end of you. She was your start, your end, and everything in between. And as you cried you knew, that a minute would turn into a lifetime.