The Place Where I Was Born and Raised
"Are you...vibrating?"
"I'm not going to dignify that with a response." Natasha wiped the sweat from her brow as she released Clint from the ground. They both were red in the face after sparring for about an hour, and Natasha was looking forward to a long shower. Clint rolled his eyes and grabbed her wrist. "Vibrating. Here. What is this anyway?" He pointed to the black band she was wearing with a small spider engraved on the top border. "I don't remember this."
"You remember all my jewelry?" Natasha lifted an eyebrow. Clint lifted one back. They stared at each other for approximately 45.7 seconds, until Natasha flipped him off and turned towards the locker room.
"Hey, hey, hey. Tasha." She kept walking. He followed because of course he did, he couldn’t bear to leave anything alone—he could be pushier than Tony sometimes—and grabbed her shoulder. She flipped him to the ground, face blank save her lips drawn tightly into a line. If it were anyone else, she knew she could get away with it, but fucking Clint and the power of “friendship” always seemed to know her tells. The way her left foot would tap when she was scared or the way she put her hair in a ponytail when she was angry. Or the way her mouth would practically disappear from biting it when she was faced with a mystery she couldn’t solve. His eyes crinkled around the edges as he watched her. “Hey.” It was soft, soft like after Thanos, after Steve saved her from Vormir, after she broke down that one time in his barn when the chicks she was watching died in her hands. And she hated that voice and loved it and resented it and relished it. She watched him warily as he stood up and grabbed her hands gently. “Let’s sit, yeah?”
Natasha Romanoff had many secrets and every single one of them was known by Clint Barton (except for the night she found herself watching The Bachelor with Happy and his fiancé, but, whatever weirdness that was seemed to be a one-off thing, not even worth mentioning, she barely remembered it anyway). She lived her life in boxes. One for assassin. One for spy. One for avenger. One for sister. One for friend. One for Tony’s personal tormentor. One for Clint. And when her life inevitably went wrong (because people like her didn’t deserve good things, people like her were only created to atone for all the bad things they caused), she would pack up a box and push it to the back of her mind.
Natasha lived her life in boxes, so when Pepper died, she did what she always did, and taped it up and shoved it aside.
‘Nat.’
‘Tony. Where are you? We’ve been trying to get through to you and—’
‘Nat. Pepper’s dead.’
‘I—’
‘Find Spider-Man, he’s hurt.’
‘Tony, do you think you should be—’
‘Natahsa. I’m begging you’
‘Of course.’
She fiddled with her bracelet as Clint waited for her to talk. It was vibrating steadily at this point and she finally slid it off and handed it to Clint. He gave her a searching look before taking it. 10 seconds. 30 seconds. 1 min.
“What the fuck, Nat?” She shrugged. (She also wanted it to be known that shrugging was not a typical Black Widow move, but this was not a typical Black Widow situation. Neither was watching The Bachelor, but again, Clint didn’t need to know about that.)
“It’s been doing this for the last 30 minutes.”
“Tasha. This is Morse code.” She gave him a very unimpressed look. “Yes, Clint. Thank you for that brilliant deduction.”
“Don’t be an ass. Why is this bracelet vibrating in Morse code? And what the hell does this mean? c l a r a a n d i r o n d a d s o s s e n d h e l p l a n c a s t e r o s b o r n p r e n t i s s h o u s e h o s t a g e c o d e 7 1 1. It keeps repeating.”
“Yes. I know.” He looked confused and a little disturbed. “What aren’t you telling me? Why haven’t you done anything about this? I could call Bruce? I think he saw Tony last…” He trailed off when he saw her stand back up.
“Rhodey called me yesterday. He wanted me to look into someone. I started, but this kid’s like a ghost, Clint. But some of the things I found were very disturbing. Then, this thing started going off today.” She looked down at him, hoping he couldn’t see how frenzied she felt, “I can’t remember where I got this bracelet.” Her voice was almost at a whisper. Clint looked shocked. “It started vibrating in fucking Morse code, and I have no recollection of where it came from. I do know this. It looks identical to the one Morgan wears. I’m assuming she got it for me at some point but honestly, I don’t know.” She laughed hollowly. “I feel like I’m going crazy. There’s something wrong with me. Morgan is 8 years-old, Clint. She doesn’t know Morse code.”
“Could it be Tony?”
“Maybe. But he never knew my nickname for him and I only call Morgan ‘Clara’ when we’re practicing dancing. No one has ever heard me say that to her. It feels like a trap. But it feels too familiar too. Too personal. I’ve been trying to call Tony and Happy and James and their phones are going straight to voicemail. I can’t access Friday because he changed the codes again—that’s your fault, by the way, if you stopped asking her to play Toxic every time Tony walked in the room, he would stop being so god-damned paranoid.”
“Nat, what’s code 711?” He stood next to her, concerned as she paled slightly.
“That’s the problem. I—I remember the code.” He gestured for her to go on. “I remember the code. But I cannot remember who I made it with. I—I think something’s wrong.”
“What’s the code, Tash?” She took a deep breath and typed it out on her phone, narrating as she went. “Code 711: In case of a spy-girl emergency, the arachnid collective will rendezvous at the nearest 7-Eleven to her last known coordinates. Cherry Slurpees will be bought immediately.”
“That’s…oddly specific.”
“No, it’s weird and immature. And sounds like something Morgan would love. But I didn’t create it, and I don’t remember this bracelet, and I can’t find this ghost boy, and if this truly is a hostage situation, I just wasted 45 minutes because I freaked out.” Clint patted her on the back and led her through the doors of the locker room.
“Shower. We leave in 5 minutes. I already texted Bruce halfway through your emotional breakdown. He and Steve are bringing the Quinjet.” He smirked. She hit him in the arm. He frowned slightly, “And Nat. Please. We aren’t keeping things from each other anymore. You can’t solve every problem by yourself. Let us help.”
Natasha Romanoff lived her life in boxes. One for Clint. One for Tony. One for Morgan. One for Slurpees and invisible boys and The Bachelor and arachnid collectives. And as she met part of her team on the tarmac, she wondered again when they’d all come crashing down.