consent
Yelena feels like she’s in trouble. Maria and Bobbi are asking her questions that she doesn’t know the answer to but had she known that they’d be quizzed then she’d prepared better.
What is consent? Consent is permission, right? Age of consent? Does that mean age of permission? What are they talking about? Why did Fury order them to have this conversation?
“The age of consent is at what age someone can agree to sex. If both people agree then the sex is consensual,” Bobbi started.
“Okay. In the United States, the age of consent ranges from 16-18 depending on the state you’re in. So if you’re under the age of sixteen then you cannot consent to sex, even if you agree,” Maria continues, picking up where Bobbi left off.
“But you just said if both people agree then it is consensual.” Yelena points out. “What if someone under the age of consent agrees?”
“Someone under the age of consent is classified as a child. Children cannot consent to sex. Sex with someone under the age of consent is called rape,” Maria continues on, her gaze shifting between the two sisters. “Do you know what rape is?”
“Forced sex,” Natalia spoke up and Yelena glances up at her. Natalia wouldn’t look at her, her gaze trained straight ahead.
“Right,” Maria agrees.
Yelena doesn’t like this conversation. Her hand moves to rest on Natalia’s leg and her fingers dig into her thigh slightly to let her know that she’s unnerved.
“Any questions so far?” Maria then asked, pausing to give them a chance to ask questions.
“What happens if someone has forced sex?” Yelena asked, feeling Natalia rest her hand over Yelena’s.
“There are factors that play into how they’re punished but they’ll ultimately end up in jail,” Bobbi pipes up and Yelena twists in her spot to look at her.
“That’s it?” Yelena asked and Bobbi tilts her head to the side.
“What do you think should happen?” Bobbi asked curiously and Yelena shrugs.
“Kill them.” Yelena replies easily before glancing at Maria, remembering where they were. “I mean…”
“Have you killed someone who had sex with you?” Maria asked and Yelena quiets down. It’s not an order and Yelena doesn’t particularly want to answer. The lack of an answer is enough of one itself. Yelena was a Widow. She seduced and killed her marks, just like any other Widow.
“I…” Yelena pauses before trailing off.
“What?” Bobbi coaxed and Yelena leans against Natalia.
“I don’t want to talk about this,” Yelena knows that it’s an order from Fury but she just wants to go do something-- anything else. “I don’t know the answers to the questions you’re asking.”
“It’s okay to not know things,” Maria replies, leaning forward in her chair. “But this conversation is an important one to have.”
Yelena glances down into her lap and Natalia gives her hand a small squeeze to try and reassure her. “Why did the Director ask me those questions?”
“I’m not entirely sure,” Maria turns her gaze to Natalia. “You were already there when we were called in. Did something happen?”
Natalia doesn’t reply at first but the grip she had on Yelena’s hand tightens until she’s protectively gripping onto her hand.
“Sister?” Yelena asked softly in Arabic. As far as she knew, neither Bobbi or Maria spoke it.
Natalia peers down at Yelena before sighing. “You kept lying to me about where you were going. You were spending so much time with the Director and lying to me about it.”
“I wasn’t lying,” Yelena protests and Natalia raised an eyebrow at her. “Not really… I was with Danvers!”
“Danvers isn’t here,” Natalia retorts, continuing before Yelena can protest. “She travels. She’s not here. I know.”
“I didn’t say I was with Carol!” Yelena defends herself before looking at Maria who was watching them carefully, not even trying to hide what she was doing. “Carol has a cat named Goose… the orange cat you’ve seen… the Director looks after Goose when Carol isn’t here. I was with Danvers… Goose Danvers.”
Natalia stares at her incredulously. “Why wouldn’t you just tell me that?”
“Because not a lot of people know about Goose and I didn’t know if I could tell you,” Yelena admits but Natalia looked upset about the fact Yelena wasn’t truthful with her. “What did you think I was doing in there?”
“I thought he was being like the General,” Natalia replies and that was all the explanation that Yelena needed. The line of questioning made sense. “I thought he was hurting you.”
Yelena wraps her arms around Natalia and feels her older sister immediately clutch her close.
“Are we good to continue?” Maria questioned when the sisters stop speaking. At their agreement, she continues on about consent and the age of consent.
She doesn’t ask any more questions except to see if they understood or needed her to expand on a point. It’s easier for Yelena to just listen instead of trying to figure out the answer to the questions she had asked.
That night, Yelena has a hard time sleeping, her dreams plagued by memories dredged up by the conversation.
The handcuffs leave marks around her wrist and Yelena gets upset to the point that she couldn’t breathe, prompting Natalia to wrap around her and encourage her to take deep breaths.
Yelena clings to her sister and tries to focus on the present. She knows that Natalia would never let anything happen to her if she had a say in it.
Yelena only calms down when Natalia holds her close in her lap. Yelena feels so very young but also very secure and safe there.
Yelena curls into her sister but she still remembers her dreams vividly. She can feel phantom hands on her body and her skin, leaving behind the need to scrub their touch off.
It gets to the point that Natalia urges her to get up so that they could go to the gym to work out whatever overwhelming feelings grip her.
Yelena doesn’t understand how Natalia wasn’t as upset as her. She knows that she’s been through similar things as her so why wasn’t she as uncomposed as Yelena?
The gym is empty when they arrive and the sisters immediately step onto the mat. Yelena doesn’t know how long they got at it but she can see that Natalia’s wearing down quickly.
“Mind if I tap in?”
Yelena jumps at the sudden voice and is quickly pinned down to the mat. She looks up at Maria, dressed in a pair of sweatpants and a tank top standing at the mats. “For who?”
Maria and Natalia have sparred before so Yelena thought Maria wanted to step in for Yelena. Instead, she surprises them by speaking. “For Natalia.” Maria glances at Natalia. “You’re exhausted. Let me go a few rounds.”
Natalia glances at Maria and they exchange a few glances. It spoke of the trust Natalia held with Maria as she steps off the mat, trusting the commander with Yelena in distress.
Yelena surges forward and takes Maria off her feet multiple times at the start. Maria kept getting back up and was learning quickly. While Natalia and Yelena were trained in nearly the exact same way, Yelena had been training with May and Bobbi while Natalia had been training with Clint.
Maria’s not rough and she puts up a fair fight. When she does knock Yelena down, she offers her a hand back up. By the time Yelena’s finally exhausted and can’t keep fighting anymore, Maria calls their spar to a stop.
“I can keep going,” Yelena protests but she sways on her feet tiredly and Maria reaches out to steady her, ignoring the tiny flinch Yelena gave at her touch.
“You can’t. And it’s okay. You can always tap out when you’re done,” Maria assures her as Natalia approaches them.
Yelena forgets that sometimes. May and Bobbi had told her that too. Natalia reaches out to take Yelena from Maria.
The two of them exchange glances and Yelena blinks at them tiredly, sure that she was sure that she must be imagining things.
But Yelena leans back against Natalia and Natalia thanks Maria for sparring with Yelena.
There it is again. The shift in body language as Maria and Natalia lock eyes.
Yelena was an assassin trained to read body language for a living but this was the first time she’s seen the way Maria and Natalia exchange glances like that.
Maria touches Natalia’s shoulder and Yelena resists the urge to shove Maria off of her sister because the way their body language was reading was that they were showing attraction toward each other.
Yelena must just be tired. She must be seeing things that aren’t there. Neither of them are acknowledging it.
Maria was nice and Yelena liked her a lot but if she was attracted to her big sister then they were gonna have problems.