The day that Yelena got her life back was the best day of her life. The cloud of red mist that had hovered over her, entrapping her for so long, had dissipated and finally, she was free. The first twenty-seven years of her life had been red mist and muddled memories, a constant fog over her mind, a constant reminder that she was not her own person. She was her own person when she met her sister for the first time in over two decades. She was her own person when she decided to help her sister take down the Red Room – to kill Dreykov for real. She was her own person when she made the decision to help other widows like her be free.
Then her life was taken from her again, and when she returned five years later, her sister was gone.
She could remember the moment she’d been told. The moment the harsh words struck her heart. I’m so sorry Yelena. Natasha’s dead. And everything in her life that had once again become clear after the Red Room had been taken down was muddled again.
She remembered not allowing herself to mourn – taking more hits and never staying in a single location for more than a couple days. She had to keep moving. She had to at least try to outrun the overwhelming feeling that threatened to drag her down into depths so deep that she’s not sure she could recover from them.
So she kept moving, and took on more jobs.
But then she heard a whisper about her funeral, and after a lot of digging, she learnt that the Avengers had planned a funeral for in a week’s time. So this time when she moved, Yelena had a goal.
She knew she was being watched the moment that she opened the rusted gate and stepped foot on the property. Out of habit more than feeling unsafe, she looked around, identifying possible exits, weapons, dangers. She made her way towards the house carefully, not knowing whether the location was still secure. Melina’s farm had been a Red Room safe house, but it had also been the woman’s home. In reality, it was just as likely that she’d find another Red Room associate here as it was that she’d find her mother.
Judging by the fact that she made it to the front door without getting shot, she was willing to believe that the house had either been abandoned or Melina was here, waiting to see if she’d actually have the guts to knock. She did. Three quick raps.
The door opened almost immediately, and Yelena was suddenly staring down the barrel of a gun. Her instinctive reaction was for her hand to flinch towards where she kept a weapon of her own, but she quickly stopped herself.
“That’s not very nice,” she said dryly as Melina lowered the weapon.
“I had to be sure.”
The pair stood in the doorway for a moment before Melina stepped to the side, allowing Yelena entrance.
“So what’s this visit all about hm? Where’s your sister?”
Yelena physically flinched, spinning around on her heels to face the woman. “You don’t know?”
Melina looked borderline bored. “Know what?”
“Natasha’s dead.” She fought to get the words past her lips – as though they were serrated blades being dragged up her throat.
There was a flicker of something there for a fleeting moment, before it was gone. “How?”
Yelena shrugged. She didn’t know. She didn’t know how her sister had died. The news had theories, but Yelena knew for a fact that the news was full of bullshit almost 100% of the time.
“There’s a funeral. Woodlawn Cemetry, New York. Monday the 25th.” Yelena handed Melina a small card with the address, date and time.
“I’m welcome?” she asked carefully.
“You were family,” Yelena choked out. And I don’t want to be alone, was what she refrained from adding. “You don’t have to come, but you deserve to say goodbye.”
“Are you inviting Alexei?”
Yelena hesitated. “I thought I’d test the waters with you first.”
“He’d want to go. He was always more sentimental than me, and despite his mistakes, he cared very much for you two.”
Yelena clenched her jaw so tightly that it ached. “I know.” His mistakes. He’d been the only one with the power to stop the Red Room from taking them and he’d done nothing. “Do you know where he is?”
Melina nodded. “I do.” She didn’t question it. She didn’t ask whether Yelena was even going to try to invite him or not. She just reached for a pen and some paper and wrote down an address.
“Thank you,” the younger widow forced out. “I need to go now.”
Melina nodded again, placing a hesitant hand on Yelena’s arm. Yelena couldn’t describe how badly she just wanted Melina to take her into her arms and rock her back and forth like she used to when Yelena was little.
Yelena pushed the thought from her mind, straightening her shoulders and leaving the house without another word.
A hundred meters down the road from Melina’s house, she made a phone call.
“I need a favour.”
“You’re about as polite as your sister,” the amused voice on the other end answered, seeming to have recognised her accent.
“I need you and something that can get me to Oslo, Norway. I can meet you at Helsinki airport.”
“What’s this about?”
Yelena hesitated. “I’ll tell you in person.”
Rick, no stranger to clients not wanted to tell him things over the phone, didn’t ask questions. “I’ll see you in Helsinki.”
It took Yelena three and a half hours to get from Saint Petersburg to Helsinki via train, and another three until Rick called her to give her the details of the plane that he was in. They barely said a word to each other until they were in the air.
“So what’s this all about? You’re less talkative than I remember.”
Because she didn’t know what to say. “Natasha’s dead. There’s a funeral.” She passed him a card. “Our father lives in Oslo.”
Rick was quiet. “She was a good one, your sister. I’m sorry.”
Yelena’s throat thickened. “She was.” She doesn’t acknowledge his apology. There was nothing for him to be sorry for. “You’ll come?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
Alexei’s house was a small old-style little thing in the middle of a small, old-style little village a few hours out of Oslo. This time, when Yelena knocked, she wasn’t greeted with a gun.
“Yelena?” he asked, face betraying his confusion.
Yelena’s mind drew a blank for words and shoved a card towards him. “Natasha’s dead. There’s a funeral. You should come.”
Alexei’s shoulders sagged. He looked down at the card in his hands then back up at Yelena, slowly.
“Life is cruel that way, huh?”
Yelena swallowed thickly, nodding as she turned on her heel.
“Wait, Yelena-“
“I’ll see you at the funeral.”
And then she was gone.
When the day of the funeral finally rolled around, Yelena was not ready. She’d woken up several hours ago, lay in bed until two hours ago, and yet for the past hour and a half, all she’d been able to do was lean against the bathroom sink and try to convince herself to get out of the apartment. It was as if she’d been rooted to the spot, unable to move or think, just stuck. Like she was under mind control all over again, none of her thoughts felt like her own.
She eventually dragged herself out of the room and onto the street. She had to pull it together.
She’d rented an apartment near the cemetery. It’s not like she had anywhere better to be. Regardless, it meant that she could walk there in half an hour.
It was easy enough to find where Natasha’s funeral was by the group of Avengers standing around. She watched from the trees, hesitant to go and closer. The sound of footsteps behind her had her stiffening slightly.
“Shall we go together?” Rick asked quietly, as if knowing she was frozen and not wanting to admit she needed someone’s help.
“Yes,” Yelena breathed, her eyes surveying the people her sister had called her family one by one. She’d shown her pictures of them once. There was Steve, the grandpa of the group – he and Nat had been close friends. She’d heard stories of them being on the run together. She also recognised Clint, Nat’s best friend. She’d never seen a man look more defeated than he seemed now. There were others, names she couldn’t put to faces. Wanda, she thinks the redhead with a numb expression is called. She doesn’t know the others for sure.
More footsteps behind her marked the arrival of Melina and Alexei. She barely acknowledged them, even as Melina placed a hand on her arm.
“Let’s go,” the woman said, sensing that if she wasn’t the one to say it, no one would move.
The group of four moved closer. Yelena steeled herself, hiding behind the familiar mask she’d long-since mastered. Beside her, Melina did the same.
They made it fairly close before the group of Avengers seemed to notice them.
“This is a private service,” Steve said, turning to them. “If you want to pay your respects, can you do it later? This service is for family.”
A flash of anger, white-hot and sharp, coursed through Yelena’s body. How dare he. How dare he.
“Please just le-“
The man didn’t have a chance to finish his sentence before Yelena was throwing herself at him, shoving him back hard enough that the supersoldier stumbled back a few paces.
“Don’t you dare!” She screamed, barely registering the words were coming out in Russian. “She was my sister!” She went to shove Steve again, but he grabbed her wrists in a bruising grip.
“What the hell?” he hissed.
He let go abruptly when Alexei punched him in the stomach hard. Steve stumbled back.
“Alexei!” Melina said harshly, placing herself between the supersoldiers. “Not here. Both of you.”
Steve scoffed, but Melina ignored it. She turned to Yelena, “Yelena,” she said quietly, pulling the blonde back gently.
Hot tears spilt over, warming Yelena’s face. “She was my sister.”
“I know,” Melina replies in soft Russian, “I know.”
“She was my sister,” Yelena repeated brokenly in English, gripping Melina’s hands in her own as she looked down at the tombstone for the first time.
She barely registered the avengers’ shock as they realised what she said.
“She had a family?” the words were Steve’s. “She never told us about you.”
“She-“ Yelena’s voice caught in a sob. “We were sisters.”
“They’re our daughters,” Melina said firmly, daring him to argue.
“And you?”
Steve looked over at Rick.
“A close friend,” Yelena answered. “He saved Natasha’s life more than once, from what I heard. He deserves to be here.”
She shouldn’t have to defend her sister’s friend’s rights to be at her funeral. But Steve didn’t look like he was about to argue. Instead, he stepped to the side. “Why don’t you join us?”
Yelena was the last to leave the service. Melina and Alexei had offered to stay, but she’d needed this. She needed this time alone to say goodbye. She knelt beside the tombstone, breaths coming in ragged gasps as tears stained her cheeks.
Grief. Absolute grief gripped her heart in an iron fist, and she finally succumbed to it. She sobbed, and her body racked with her cries as she gripped the stone that marked the only physical memory of her sister with a hold so tight her fingers ached.
The Red Room didn’t allow love. They didn’t allow the presence of it, and certainly not the admittance of it. Despite that, Natasha had shown Yelena how she loved her, even if they’d never said the words to each other. Yelena did now. Her broken whispers of ‘I love you’ in as many languages as she knew in-between heartbroken sobs was the only sound in the cemetery. She hoped to any god who heard her that Natasha could hear the words, know how much Yelena had loved her, and how heart wrenching it was that she was gone.
When she could finally breathe again, Yelena whistled out two notes. Two simple notes that she’d never be able to forget. The notes drifted into the air. No response. She was really gone.