Chapter 1
The very first time that Yelena ever tasted a drop of alcohol was when she was five.
She had only wanted to know what the amber liquid in her daddy’s glass was. She hadn’t even asked for a taste, she just wanted to know. So, she asked.
“What’s that, Daddy?” Yelena inspected the condensation on the glass and how it left a wet ring behind on his pants where it was resting.
Her daddy had laughed and held the glass out toward her. “Take a sip,” he encouraged, his figure looming over her as he leaned forward and pressed a finger to his lips. “But do not tell your mother. This is our little secret, yeah?”
Yelena liked secrets, they made her feel special and important that someone would trust her. The thought of sharing one with her daddy made her feel giddy so she nodded and took a tiny sip.
It burned going down, leaving behind an ashy taste in her mouth as she choked, her eyes watering. “It’s spicy!”
Her daddy laughed, slapping her on the back as she sputtered and coughed. “You’ll like it when you’re bigger,” he assured her, taking a large gulp without a flinch.
Yelena immediately went to her sister to plead for help to get a glass of juice, telling her that she had put something yucky inside of her mouth and she had to get the bad taste to go away.
Natasha’s nose wrinkled. “Maybe you’ll learn your lesson and actually listen to Mom before sticking things in your mouth that don’t belong there,” she huffed, turning her attention back to the book she was reading.
“But it’s bad!” Yelena could still taste it. It coated her tongue and left her mouth feeling sticky and gross no matter how hard she tried to wipe it off with her shirt. “See?” She opened her mouth and stuck her tongue out, almost confident that there was still some left in her mouth.
Natasha sighed and put her book down, leaning forward to indulge her before jerking back a moment later, covering her nose. “Why were you drinking scotch?” She demanded, her face suddenly twisted with anger.
“It was Daddy’s drink. I just wanted to know what it was!” Yelena tried to explain, once again fruitlessly rubbing at her tongue with the collar of her shirt. She froze when Natasha grabbed her shoulders harshly.
“Don’t you ever drink anything that Dad offers you from his glass ever again,” Natasha’s face was serious, her tone firm. “Do you understand?”
“I won’t, I won’t!” Yelena promised, wiggling in her sister’s grip. “It was yucky!”
Natasha then let her go and got Yelena the glass of juice she wanted but then dragged her to the bathroom and squirted a good amount of her bubblegum toothpaste onto her toothbrush and told her to brush her teeth. “Don’t let Mom smell your breath tonight.”
Yelena doesn’t question her older sister, taking her toothbrush and brushing her teeth long enough to make her mouth fill with foamy bubbles that made the bad taste in her mouth go away.
She avoided getting too close to her mommy’s face that night.
She never drank anything from her daddy again.
The first time she had a fully-fledged drink, she was nine. She had only been in the Red Room for three years and was put on an undercover mission with an older Widow at an expensive ball.
Her target, an older man that smiled too wide and touched too much with a taste for girls a little younger than they should be, pressed a flute of champagne into her hands as she attempted to get the information that she needed from him.
“This will be our little secret,” he whispered to her, pressing a finger to his lips as he winked. He glanced around, looking for the woman that was posing as Yelena’s mother before he held his own flute up and grabbed her wrist to manipulate her hand so that he could tap their glasses together.
He took a sip of his so after a moment of hesitation, Yelena mimicked.
Champagne wasn’t as bad as scotch. It was bubbly, almost like soda in a way, and it tasted slightly bitter with hints of something fruity. Yelena could almost pretend that it was one of the cherry sodas she was allowed to get from the cold drink case by the check-out whenever she went grocery shopping with what was once her mommy back in Ohio.
She had been taught to mimic actions in the Red Room, a tactic that was used to manipulate and gain a target’s trust. Therefore, whenever her target drank, she did as well. When the first glass was empty, he plucked it from her grasp and pressed a new one into her hands.
She knew that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with the drinks that he was trying to give her. She had started to feel funny after her first glass, almost like she was floating, and she started to have a hard time remembering the information that he was slipping to her.
She only got a few sips into the second glass when the older Widow, only known to Yelena by her cover name Talia, a woman posing to be her mother, found them, ready to interrupt much earlier than was planned.
The man quickly snatched the flute back from Yelena, sheepishly thanking her for holding it for him as though she wasn’t in the middle of another sip, and he fled quickly back into the crowd.
“How much did you drink?” Talia questioned quietly, crouching in front of Yelena to gain her attention.
“One,” Yelena mumbled, suddenly realizing that she was very tired although she had gone much longer without sleep. “And a little bit.”
Talia leaned back, carefully balanced on her tall heels as she exhaled sharply through her nose and nodded before rising to her feet. “Did you get what was needed?”
Although her memory was a bit muddied and just trying to recall the conversation felt like wading through molasses, Yelena nodded. She knew that she had the information needed.
Talia grabbed her hand and started to tug her toward the exit. Yelena hadn’t anticipated the way that everything felt off balance as she stepped forward. It was like when she was blindfolded and sent to navigate her way through an obstacle course. Each step she took made the room shift side to side like she was on a boat in the ocean.
Yelena carefully took her steps as she followed Talia toward the courtyard of the ball, trying her best not to trip or stumble, her eyes planted on her black Mary Jane shoes to watch for obstacles when two hands suddenly slid under her armpits and hoisted her up.
Yelena hadn’t been expecting the touch and yelped slightly at the shift, trying to regain her balance as Talia settled her on her hip.
Talia was holding her and walking. Yelena wasn’t sure how she was supposed to react. She was stiff, slightly afraid of Talia and what she could do. Talia was her superior. Yelena knew that she hadn’t been going fast enough but Talia must have been angry with her.
“You are a tired child that wants to go home,” Talia suddenly hissed in her ear. “Act like it.”
Yelena doesn’t dare disobey. She allowed herself to droop onto Talia now that she had permission, loosely wrapping her arms around Talia’s neck as she tucked her face into Talia’s shoulder to hide it. She forced herself to relax and focused on the sound of Talia’s calm heartbeat and the soothing swaying motion as she walked.
Yelena was only supposed to act like a tired child but she found herself slipping and nearly falling asleep, unable to help herself. Talia had loose ends to tie up and Yelena wasn’t supposed to be there for that but she doesn’t dare argue with her superior. Talia was in charge, not her.
Her presence seemed to soften Talia’s targets despite their supposed disgust for rich spoiled brats. They fawned over Yelena and the frilly frock that she wore. Talia would rock Yelena and coo as she rubbed her back like the proud mother that her cover claimed she was.
Yelena did the unthinkable and fell asleep. She knew that she shouldn’t have but with Talia’s low voice whispering such nice things and the hand rubbing her back as Talia shifted in a rocking motion every so often, Yelena just couldn’t help herself.
She woke up later on with a small jolt, cold wind blowing against her skin as the moon shone high in the sky. Talia was walking down the street back toward the hotel that was rented for the purpose of the mission and Yelena felt sick to her stomach as she took stock of the situation.
She opened her mouth to tell Talia that she could walk and apologize for her insubordination but a hand suddenly cupped the back of her head and pushed it back to where it was tucked against Talia’s shoulder moments before. There were no words spoken by Talia but Yelena heard the unspoken order and kept her head there.
When they were safely back inside the hotel room, Talia sat Yelena down on the single bed and asked for a mission report. It was not routine to give it immediately but Yelena obediently parroted back as much of the information as she could remember, her head pounding and mouth dry.
“You were foolish to drink so much,” Talia said when Yelena finished, tugging her to her feet before she started to unzip the dress Yelena wore. “You got drunk.”
“Drunk?” Yelena repeated, shivering slightly as the dress dropped to the floor at her feet and Talia started undoing the bobby pins in her hair.
“Yes.” Talia’s tone was curt but she doesn’t sound too upset. “You must be feeling sick.”
Feeling unwell was a weakness and Yelena knew better. “I’m fine.”
Talia paused from where she was letting Yelena’s hair down to pinch a nearly-healed bruise on her rib. “Do not lie to me. Consuming so much alcohol in such a small body is bound to make anyone sick.” Talia combed her fingers through Yelena’s hair to check for any missed bobby pins. “Go to bed. If you feel like emptying your stomach then do it in the wastebasket or toilet. You are not to make a mess.”
Yelena wasn’t punished for her failures. She wasn’t even handcuffed to the bed, although it was probably more in fear of her getting sick during the night.
And get sick she did.
She woke up with her stomach twisting and barely made it to the bathroom. Talia collected her hair back out of her face as Yelena regurgitated fancy champagne and hors d'oeuvres into the toilet bowl. The rest of the night was spotty. Yelena couldn’t remember when she had been moved from the toilet back to bed. She vaguely recalled leaning against Talia, shivering as something cold was pressed against the back of her neck.
Yelena had heard of the term ‘hungover’ before but she never truly comprehended how bad it made people feel until she woke up that morning. Her head ached and while her stomach hurt and she felt sick, she was so incredibly thirsty.
Talia had been frighteningly kind to her. As Talia started their trip back to the Red Room, she stopped by a coffee shop and bought Yelena a banana muffing and some juice. Yelena quietly asked her what she wanted in return but Talia just firmly told her to eat.
After their return, Yelena stood next to Talia with her head bowed and hands clasped behind her back as she listened to the woman give a mission report to the General. Talia does not mention Yelena getting drunk or sick. She does not mention Yelena’s failure or the way that she fell asleep on her. She mentioned Yelena’s consumption of champagne to entice the target and that was it.
Yelena decided that despite the hangover, she liked champagne far more than scotch.
Talia’s praise of Yelena’s work to the General had her put on more undercover work at balls. Yelena quickly became accustomed to the sharp bubbly taste of fruit lingering in her mouth. She never drank more than a few sips, having learned her lesson the last time. She instead measured each sip carefully, learning to lean into the hesitant child role as she either cradled the glass between her fingers with poise or clasped the glass between her hands like an innocent naive child depending on her target.
None of her handlers had been as kind to Yelena as Talia had been. Yelena still felt headaches and dry mouths but she rarely became sick, limiting her intake.
She got used to the taste of champagne and occasional fruity cocktail until she turned fourteen. It was then decided that she was old enough to start undercover work at bars. Her lessons on seduction were put to use and Yelena became intimately familiar with the graffitied walls of bar bathrooms and the smell of sweat. The taste of cheap beer suddenly became somewhat comforting to wash the taste out of her mouth after each target.
She was then introduced to vodka. She made a fool out of herself when she took her first shot and choked on it, coughing it back up onto the crop top she wore. Luckily, her target found it amusing, calling her adorable as he clasped her on the back in a way that reminded Yelena of the very first taste of alcohol she ever had. Another shot was pushed in front of her and Yelena managed to swallow it down that time, her eyes watering and throat burning.
Champagne was reserved for fancy parties where she was never alone long enough for her targets to try anything, where Yelena knew that there was another Widow poised with her to watch her back. Beer was for when her targets wanted to get on her good side, letting a ‘pretty little thing’ like her ‘have fun’ in exchange for a favor. Vodka became what her targets would use when they wanted her to get too drunk too fast so that she wouldn’t be coherent enough to stop whatever they wanted to do.
Suddenly Yelena was introduced to tequila. She learned what body shots were and quickly became familiar with how her target thought that two girls together were hot.
Yelena became accustomed to laying on the bar counter, the feeling of rock salt lining down her stomach as she held her breath so the shot glass didn’t spill off her navel while she held a lime wedge in her mouth.
She found that girls were always much gentler than guys and the ones roped into her target’s antics rarely touched her anywhere inappropriate. More often than not, a brush of their lips as the lime wedge exchanged mouths was all the intimate contact that Yelena minded. She could deal with the feeling of saliva and wet salt drying on her stomach but any set of lips against hers felt wrong.
Yelena knew her way around navigating bars and their patrons like the back of her hand, unfortunately returning drunk after her missions more often than not. She learned to give her report immediately rather than wait and her handler would usually permit her to go sit under a cold shower to get the stench of alcohol off of her. She only had two handlers who preferred to have her dance ballet to sweat the alcohol out of her system, punishing her for her stumbling and tripping.
Yelena had once returned after a mission, only slightly tipsy but drenched in the smell of alcohol after a glass of beer was spilled on her shirt. The General had pulled her close and sniffed her, laughing at the sharp scent clinging to her clothes.
She was called into his office the next day and despite her hangover, he coaxed her into kneeling next to him before he pressed a glass of amber liquid into her hands.
She recognized immediately from the color and smell that it was scotch.
It was a mistake to try and decline. She should have known better than to try and say no to the General. His face twisted in anger and he snatched the glass to shove it against her lips, the rim clipping her teeth as scotch sloshed over her chin and soaked her uniform.
“Drink,” he ordered her coldly and she choked and sputtered but finished the whole glass.
That was the first time that Yelena had drunk herself into a blackout, unable to remember what happened as the General kept refilling the glass in her hands, alcohol dribbling down her chin as he kept urging her to drink faster.
She regained function over her mind and body much later, unable to tell how much time had passed. She was still in the General’s office, kneeling at his side with her head pillowed in his lap as he stroked her hair like she was a dog. Her clothes had been discarded at some point and she was naked, her skin sticky. She ached and the lights were too bright but for some strange reason that made her want to cry, the hand on her head was comforting and she hated that.
“Shh, don’t move my little Widow,” The General crooned to her when she shifted. “Just relax.”
Yelena had no other choice but to obey.
Champagne was for parties and balls.
Beer was for graffitied bathrooms.
Vodka was for dirty men.
Tequila was for party girls.
Scotch was for her daddy the General.
It was a cycle that Yelena became accustomed to. She was intimately familiar with the aftertaste of a wide variety of alcohol and how it felt to have each one leave her lips as she draped over a toilet bowl.
She learned to fight while tipsy and how to easily end any rocky situations that she found herself in while she was drunk.
As she climbed the ranks, she was suddenly switched to a different section and she was suddenly given smaller assignments.
Yelena was put in charge of only female targets, most of them blushing young college students trying to cut loose and enjoy themselves.
It was almost stupidly easy for Yelena to manipulate them because she discovered the unspoken rule about women in bars: they always have each other's backs.
Yelena only had to slide into their space with a soft floaty giggle before leaning closer to whisper that there was a man who wouldn’t leave her alone and was getting pushy. Almost always would her target give her a smile and wrap an arm around her shoulders like they were old friends as they asked if she needed a ride home. Yelena would suggest drinks with a friendly smile and they would almost always accept.
The fruity taste of cocktails became as familiar as the taste of strawberry lip gloss.
While Yelena hated the feeling of lips against hers, girls were almost always gentle kissers. Paper umbrellas and cherry stems tied in knots would lead Yelena to lure her targets away with lowered inhibitions and loose lips.
She found quite quickly that she would be the first girl that many of the women would be with. They were usually experimenting, hesitant as they questioned her youth.
Yelena learned to wink at them and promise that she had plenty of experience already. The girls she seduced don’t ask her age or why she was in a bar, assuming that she must at least be the age of consent. Yelena does not correct them.
When heated make-outs turned to shirts being tugged off, Yelena would often take the lead between the sheets. It would be the only smidge of control she got in her life and while she relished that power, she hated sex. She may prefer having sex with women than men but she would much rather prefer not to have sex at all.
Yelena never felt bad about luring drunk men into bed to take advantage of their post-coital bliss but doing it to drunk women made her feel sick.
Most of the girls were those rich ones whose daddy was some bigwig that Yelena needed an in with. The girls themselves were innocent.
Rarely was Yelena meant to be a true Black Widow and finish her target off right after she seduced them. She’d lay there in some college dorm room, pressed against another girl under the sheets until the girl would find a good reason to kick her out.
The worst part about being unable to finish the job was the intimacy of it all.
Yelena could pretend that it was the alcohol in their system that would make the women caress her cheek like she was something fragile and call her pretty and mean it, and Yelena could almost pretend that she doesn’t lean into the gentle touch.
She would lay awake long after her target fell asleep, staring at some poster on the wall of an old band or diagrams for whatever class they were currently taking as her body burned through the alcohol. The girl pressed against her would blissfully sleep, not at all aware that the girl laying next to her was capable of killing them at any moment.
Yelena had gotten used to her reprieve from killing, spoiled by clumsy touches and girls that begged for her to touch them because they were unaware of the blood on her hands. It almost felt normal in a way as she lay in college dorms, wondering if in some alternate reality, she would be the one laying next to a girl, studying some obscure subject that she was fascinated with as she let loose and experimented with what life had to offer.
She knew that she had gotten far too complacent with herself when the Red Room abruptly changed their routine and shoved her into another new situation. She went from ‘lesbian college experiment’ to ‘clumsy naive intern’. She was thrust around middle-aged businessmen who leered at her too-short pencil skirt and there she was introduced to her first taste of rum.
She learned how it felt to have rum dry on her skin after ‘spilling’ it on her blouse more than once, apologetically unbuttoning the top few buttons as whatever man she was with would offer her the handkerchief in his pocket to help mop it up.
Yelena felt like she failed a test she was unaware of when she was yanked from the ‘clumsy naive intern’ role and shoved back into her usual specialties.
Charity balls, bar bathrooms, and college dorms. She was suddenly paired up with Widows again and sent out on partnered missions.
Yelena was partnered on a mission where the younger Widow she was with had gotten inebriated. Yelena recalled the kindness that Talia had once shown her and passed it on. She had only managed to do it twice.
The third time she attempted to extend that kindness, the Widow rejected her advances, called her a weak failure, and snitched on her to the General. Yelena felt no remorse when she was then instructed to kill the girl who snitched.
With time, Yelena learned that the Red Room ensured there was always one sober superior when out on big undercover missions. The reason they were planted there was for if things went wrong, and there was always a chance with lowered inhibitions. They were also there to stop the girls from trying to slip away or run.
Yelena had never paid them much mind until the first time her drink was spiked and she got roofied. She wasn’t sure how a pill made its way into her drink but she recalled stumbling into the broad chest of a man that held her up and how utterly hot she felt as her heart beat fast in her chest.
She regained consciousness in a motel room with nothing more than a missing shirt and she watched through blurry vision as her handler killed her assailant. Yelena’s shirt was then tugged over her head and she was yanked to her feet by her handler as she was told to pay more attention next time or they wouldn’t intervene until afterward.
She was thankful for them, even if she does not vocalize it.
When Yelena was seventeen there was a defection from the Red Room and all Widows not on missions were locked down. It was only for a few days but Yelena felt antsy, unable to focus on the whispers that went around of who got out. Yelena just wanted to get back out on missions, she wanted the taste of cocktails on her tongue and sweet college girls that gave her the control she lacked.
She was let out two weeks later and drank until her head pounded and her heart raced because it was stupidly familiar and comforting.
When Yelena was nineteen, she and the rest of the Widows in the Red Room were chemically subjugated and her control was ripped from her. It reminded her of being blackout drunk and each time she was ‘woken up’ she felt so nauseous that her handlers learned to keep a bucket nearby for whenever they pulled her out.
Yelena could scarcely recall what she did when she was under but she would wake up with a headache pounding at her skull and could tell by the lingering taste of alcohol on her tongue what type of mission she had been on.
Waking up with no taste of alcohol in her mouth would frighten her the most. Those types of missions meant that she had been violent. There was usually nothing but a slight metallic tang that made her sick.
Champagne was for balls. Beer was for graffitied bathrooms. Vodka was for dirty men. Tequila was for saliva drying on her stomach. Scotch was for the General. Cocktails were for college girls. Rum was for businessmen.
Yelena’s preferred drink switched from champagne to cocktails to vodka. She liked vodka when she was subjugated because any hazy memory she would usually have would be gone and it would be a small relief to not remember what had been done to her, even if she could usually feel it in the form of bruises on her hips or pain between her legs.
She was convinced that alcohol burned through her veins with her blood, unsure if she was ever truly sober or if she had learned to function while tipsy.
She lived on alcohol. It was what made her the best child assassin in the world, it was what made her successful.
Yelena hated the very thing that got her to complete her mission perfectly each time.
But she needed it.