Chapter 4
Clint can’t remember the last time his life had this much structure. He can’t remember being told to go to bed or not being abruptly woken up by his brother at random hours of the night/morning telling them they need to move before someone bust them. He can’t remember a time where he was consistently fed the three standard meals of the day. And he can’t remember the last time he was referred to by his actual name more than he was referred to by a moniker. Yet almost 48 hours into living in this household and all of those things have been done.
For the second morning in a row, he gets breakfast. Unlike the day before, he actually manages to eat some of the food seeing as it was Phil who filled the bowl and told him he expected it all to be finished. It seemed like an order in his mind, so he couldn’t not listen to it. Just like the previous day when Phil told everyone to wrap up everyone was quick to finish their meals, put on their shoes, grab their bags, and run out the door for their day of school. One thing that was different from yesterday, though, is that rather than it just being Bucky left at the table with him Steve remained back as well.
“Steve, school,” Phil says with a raised brow as he notices the boy still at the table.
“So, Phil, here’s the thing, I forgot to give this to you yesterday,” Steve says with a not so sheepish smile as he passes an envelope to Phil.
The older man raises a brow as he opens the envelope before sighing and looking at the boy in annoyance.
“Suspended? Really?” Phil says as he analyzes Clint’s bowl to make sure it’s been cleared enough for his liking.
“Yeah, I was gonna mention it after group, but then I got distracted. And I assumed Maria would have been told but then no one came to talk to me last night so I realized that obviously didn’t happen and now here we are.”
“Is this because of track? Steve, we’ve talked about this: they’re keeping you off the team right now because of your behavior. If you want to rejoin you’re gonna have to behave and from it looks like also apologize,” Phil sighs as he removes his glasses and places the paper down. “You had to break the coaches glasses?”
“Didn’t realize I ran so fast that a gust of wind would knock them off?” Steve replies with a chuckle.
“A shoulder probably helped,” Bucky says under his breath as he finishes his cereal.
“Alright, enough. Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now. You three finish your breakfast then go get changed for the day, even though you won’t be in school we still need to go over there. Gotta talk to the principal about Bucky starting again next week, you, Steve, need to apologize to your coach, and Clint we’ve gotta get you registered with the school and some placement tests done.”
All three boys seem to simultaneously roll their eyes before moving to go upstairs. It’s when Clint comes back downstairs wearing the same outfit from the day previous that Phil realizes he hadn’t set the boy up with a wardrobe of any sorts.
“Clint, let’s go back upstairs and get you fresh clothes. I have some staple items I can set you up with, but I think after visiting the school we should get you some of your own things as well,” Phil says as he grabs the boy’s hand to guide him upstairs.
Clint is quick to remove his hand from the older man’s grip, and Phil doesn’t miss the way the boy’s cheeks pinken up in an embarrassed manner. Something he’s noted that the boy easily becomes, so he assumes there may have been a lot of childish taunting in his years on the street and potentially even before then. Pushing the thought aside, the man sets him up with some fresh jeans and a fresh t-shirt, before meeting the older two boys by the front door of the house.
As the four make their way outside the house, Bucky is quick to separate from the bunch so that he could grab the front seat before Steve, leaving the blonde boy to be in the back with Clint. The drive is relatively quiet aside from the occasional instance of Steve reaching over the seat to flick Bucky’s ear or play with the radio station before they’re pulling up to the school. All four are quick to get out of the car and make their way into the school, and seeing as it was now just after 8:45 AM this meant all the students were switching from homeroom to their first classes of the day. Because of this the hallways seemed extremely packed, though, it didn’t seem to bother neither Phil, Bucky, or Steve.
It did bother Clint though.
The boy should have figured Steve and Bucky wouldn’t be thrown off by the crowdedness seeing as they typically attend school there, however, he couldn’t help but be jealous. Having been on the streets for the past couple years, the one thing Clint has come to realize is that crowds are bad. People get lost in crowds. Or hurt. Or even worse, they get caught. Because of this he and Barney always avoided them, however, now it appears to be biting him in the ass because he feels terrified.
Phil notices the second they step foot into the hallway that Clint’s anxiety spikes. Not only is he in an unknown area swarmed by people, but his hearing aids are acting up so now he feels trapped and can’t hear anything going on around him. Unlike the day before where Clint tried to keep a distance between, it appeared today as though he wanted to get as close as possible without touching the man. Phil wishes he could assure the boy that everything would be fine, however, he can tell that the boy doesn’t want to hear that, so he settles for subtly grabbing onto the boy’s hand, offering a small smile when the terrified eyes look up at him.
Unlike earlier this morning, Clint doesn’t pull away, but rather takes a small step closer so that the separation is a bit less while moving the other hand to try and adjust his hearing aids. Luckily for him they manage to make it to the office relatively quickly after that. As they approach the door, Clint doesn’t know what to expect. He hasn’t formally been to school since he was nine– maybe– and even then he never lived in a good school district and administration never seemed to care about anyone or anything. For some reason, he wasn’t expecting to be met with a well organized office surrounded by smiling faces– one including Maria.
“Hi Clint, nice surprise seeing you here this morning,” Maria says with a smile as she sees Clint before the other three.
“Didn’t realize we were doing an early field trip here?” She continues upon seeing Phil, Bucky, and Steve following in afterwards.
“Yes, well, Steve forgot to tell us he was suspended for an encounter he had with the track coach yesterday,” Phil says with a slight look of annoyance as he looks back at the boy with a raised brow. “So we just decided to get that apology out of the way as well as have Bucky talk about his coming back to school next Monday, and get Clint his placement test to do with the tutors. What are you doing in the office? I thought you had a meeting with the school board superintendent this morning?”
Before Maria could answer, though, a furious looking Natasha comes storming into the office followed by a patient looking teacher.
“This is why,” Maria says with a smile. “Natasha, please breathe. Go wait for me in my office, you can make yourself a cup of tea if you’d like, and I’ll be in in a moment. If you decide you want to go home Phil is already here, so I’m sure he can take one more kid on his adventure back to the house.”
The anger on the girl’s face seems to subside, however, she still shoves her way through Bucky and Steve as well as manages to knock shoulder quite hard against Clint. Always having good balance, Clint barely moved from his position, though, he’d be lying if he didn’t think that he’d be left with a bruise later that evening.
“Just some classroom drama I think, but she’ll probably go home with you,” Maria says with a soft smile.
“Yeah I figured. Okay, well, come on guys let’s go in to see Principal Carter and get some apologies out into the air while the day is still young.”
As Clint finds himself being led towards the door that says principal he realizes his once loose grip on Phil’s hand has turned tight, and he can’t help but scold himself for appearing weak in front of so many housemates but also random strangers. Barney would be humiliated. Regardless, though, Clint finds himself still being led towards the now ominous looking door only to have it suddenly opened by an individual who did not look like they belonged behind it.
“Principal Carter, good to see you again,” Phil says with a smile, though, Clint can’t help but wrinkle his nose at the dripping sarcasm.
“We will see each other on a good occasion soon, I can feel it,” the woman behind the door says with a smile as she guides the four into the room. “And who’s this? New addition?”
“Yes, this is Clint Barton. He moved in two nights ago, so part of the reason for today’s visit is getting a couple placement exams for him to do with our tutors later today.”
“Yes, of course! I’ll have Aden put together a folder of tests. For right now, it’s very nice to meet you Clint. How old are you, sweetheart?” The woman asks in a voice that Clint does not appreciate at all, however, he still appears shaken up because for some reason he can’t get words to formulate.
“He’s our youngest house member actually, 12 years old. I think his hearing aids are still trying to readjust from the noise in the hallway,” Phil says when he notices the boy isn’t going to reply.
“You’ve just got a whole mix of kids over there, huh? Alright, well, we’ll get that set up while we talk about the other issues I’m assuming you’re also here for?”
Rather than Phil replying now, though, it’s Bucky stepping forward offering his apologies for the last fight that he was involved in as well as an envelope of all the work he had skipped since the semester began just two months prior. Phil provided the evaluation charts from the tutors to Principal Carter to show that Bucky was making an effort to do his work as well as show a game plan that the boy, his tutor, and Phil had come up with to make sure he stays on top of his work as well as a way to not become overwhelmed when he gets confused. There was also a new plan for how Bucky plans to handle his temper in situations that may aggravate him, and how he plans to implement them into his everyday schooling. After a couple of questions everything seemed to work itself out and Principal Carter agreed that Bucky is ready to start back in school come Monday.
Steve was next to apologize for his outburst, though, eventually his coach was called in so that he would not have to do it twice. He apologized for his behavior while also issuing an agreement for how he plans to go about what to do when he’s angry in the future. Much to his pleasure, though, his part didn’t end up being solely an apology as his coach agreed if he could go the remainder of the cross country season just training without complaining or starting any fights, then he’d be able to rejoin the track team come the beginning of their season.
“See, boys, this wasn’t so bad, huh?” Phil says as he looks at each boy, eyes shining with pride for how they handled themselves.
“Yes, Phil, we see that some of your methods aren’t completely useless,” Bucky says with a short smile.
“Alright, well, I will see you two here on Monday morning. And Clint, I look forward to having you join us soon,” Principal Carter says as the four exit the office.
“Clint, buddy, come on pick out some shirts you like,” Phil says in an exasperated manner.
They’ve been at Target for nearly 40 minutes now, and Bucky, Steve, and Natasha have all picked out a good amount of clothes, however, Clint has yet to even touch one article of clothing. Phil feels as though he’s twisting the boy’s arm backwards or asking him to eat raw brussel sprouts with how adamant Clint is to not get any new clothes.
“And like I’ve said a hundred times now: I. Am. Fine. I don’t need new stuff, you gave me three new shirts and three new pants already,” Clint said as though it were common sense.
“Sweetheart, that isn’t enough, you need a wardrobe. How about some shorts? Long sleeved shirts? Pajamas?”
“I don’t want anything,” Clint says in the loudest voice he’s used since being brought in by the police.
“Phil can you just pick out stuff for him? I’m bored and his temper tantrum is annoying,” Natasha says with a roll of her eyes.
“I’m not having a temper-”
“I wasn’t talking to you. Don’t talk to me unless addressed, thank you,” Natasha cuts off with a glare that nearly has Clint taking a step backwards.
“Natasha, please do not taunt Clint. I have an idea, how about you three go towards the food section and pick out something we can bake once we get home? Nothing with hazelnuts or nutella though,” Phil says, though, he doesn’t even need to finish his sentence before the older three are walking off leaving Phil with a frustrated looking Clint.
Phil looks at the boy and he can’t help but sigh. All the kids that come through their program are unique, however, there’s always been a mild common ground within them to just have someone that they can trust. Phil has always worked off of that to get the kids to listen during the beginning of their stay, however, with Clint, Phil is beginning to realize the same isn’t the case with him. And he should have figured it wouldn’t be.
Clint lived on his own for two years.
And before that he was abused to the point that he was better off living on his own even if he was just a child.
He’s learned through experience that if you need something done you need to do it yourself. And that the only person you can really trust is yourself. And because of this, Phil has a feeling the boy has no idea/the capability to accept help from others even when they honestly mean it.
“Clint, I promise this isn’t a trick. We need to get you clothes, so you’re not wearing the same two outfits everyday. I want to do this, sweetie,” Phil says as he bends down to be on one knee so he’s more leveled with the shorter stature boy.
“I don’t need anything,” Clint says once again, though, this time his voice sounds more similar to a whine than a command.
As Phil goes to reply, he’s cut off by a voice he hadn’t been expecting
“It’s not about needing, it’s about having,” Steve says with a roll of his eyes as he holds two plastic wrappings in his hand. “Come on, how about if you get choices, huh? Here, boxers or briefs?”
“Either are fine,” Clint says, though, his arms finally uncross as though he might be open to this way of choosing items.
“No that’s bullshit. No one likes both, you’ve got to have a preference or style length,” Steve says with a silly smile. “How about boxer briefs?”
“Y-yeah, those seem good,” Clint says, and Phil feels as though the Heavens had to of just opened up.
“Alright progress! We’ll grab a couple packs of those then,” Phil says as he grabs four packs of the extra small size before holding up four polo shirts. “How about we pick two?”
From there the process of gathering clothes goes much faster. Steve and Phil alternate holding up articles of clothing before finally Phil is happy with the amount of pieces they’ve collected. In theory, he wishes they could get a couple more, however, the anxious look was starting to form on Clint’s face again and Phil wanted to stop while they were on a high.
Eventually, they met back up with Bucky and Natasha, paid for the items of clothes, and made their way home where the tutors had just seemed to have arrived.
“Alright, guys, you all need to do your schoolwork for the day. Go with the tutors, and I’ll put the bags in your rooms. You can unpack everything later.”
The three older kids make their way into the living room, so Clint figures he should join them, however, once he’s there he’s not really sure what he should be doing. Apparently his lost look didn’t go unnoticed as one of the tutors gave him a small smile.
“And you must be Clint?” the man said after placing a packet of work down in front of Natasha. “I’m Sam, I’m gonna be working with you as your teacher until you’re ready to go back to school. It’s nice to meet you, Clint.”
Clint doesn’t say anything just nods as he allows himself to be guided into the family room area over towards a desk that already had the packet they had gotten from the school earlier in the day on it.
“Alright, bud, can you write your full name on the first page of the notebook along with how old you are and today’s date?” Sam instructs as he hands the boy a notebook and pencil.
Again, Clint doesn’t speak but he does grab the notebook from the man and open it up to the first page. The pencil in his hand feels weird because he hasn’t had to write things down in quite awhile, however, regardless of the feeling he begins to do what the man asked. With a shaky hand he begins to spell out his full name until there’s a Clinton Francis Barton written in a scratchy handwriting across the top line– some letters being unproportioned to the others.
“Uh, sorry,” Clint says embarrassed as he analyzes how his handwriting turned out before dropping the pencil.
“There’s nothing to apologize for, that’s your name isn’t it?” Sam says as he looks at the paper.
“Y-yeah but it’s messy,” Clint says as he moves to rip the page out. “I can do it again.”
“No, no, Clint, there’s no need for that. Your handwriting is fine. This isn’t part of the placement testing, bud, it’s not a test or anything.”
“Oh, uh, okay, um, for my age do you want me to spell out the numbers or just like use the numbers?”
“How about we do both, hmm?”
Clint nod as he begins to write out I am twe however when he once again puts the pencil down Sam can’t help but quirk his head at the boy.
“Um, h-how-how do you spell twelve?” Clint asks in an embarrassed manner because he knows this is something he should know how to spell.
“Hey, no need to be embarrassed it’s a hard word to get. You’re halfway there, though, so that’s good. It’s t-w-e-l-v-e.”
As Clint finishes writing out the rest of what Sam wanted, Phil makes his way into the room to explain to Clint what they’re gonna be doing. So apparently one exam is the school’s general entrance exam to place student’s in the correct grades, followed by another test that their home created that’s supposed to be more well versed. Sam was going to be with him throughout the whole thing and he was open for as many questions as needed. When Clint nodded his head in understanding, Phil smiled before leaving the two alone in the room once again.
Clint is once again seated on the window bench in his room later in the day, having just completed all the assignments Phil and Sam wanted him to do. He wasn’t sure how he should feel about the whole thing because he feels like he had to ask questions on every question in the packet which just proves he’ll definitely be placed in a grade lower than he should be in. He almost hopes they just decide school won’t even be able to benefit him and not have him do it because anything would be better than being constantly stuck at a first grade class level. As he dives deeper and deeper into his thoughts, he’s cut off by a knock on the wall.
“C’mon, we’re all hanging out downstairs. It’s much better to have the house on your side than against you, so if I were you I’d start hanging out with us,” Steve says with a grin as he enters the room.
“TV static hurts my ears, thanks though,” Clint chooses to explain because he has a feeling Steve isn’t looking to take no for an answer.
“Just come on, we’ll do something with the TV off,” Steve says as he grabs the boy’s arm and begins to drag him down the stairs.
As the two get downstairs the first thing Clint notes is the unimpressed looks coming from both Natasha and Bucky, however, Steve seems to be choosing to ignore that.
“Come on, let’s go outside. It’s gonna be too cold eventually to just chill out in the yard,” Steve says as he continues to drag Clint outside with him– quickly shouting to Phil that they’ll all be in the front.
Clint wasn’t sure if the other two were gonna follow but sure enough they did. At first the four were quite literally just sitting out in the front yard, not speaking or anything. But eventually it seems Bucky got tired of the quiet and got up to grab a football.
“I’ve got Tasha, you can get the runt, Stevie, since it was your idea we all hang out,” he says before calling hut.
What started with an uncomfortable hangout, has now turned into a street football game that has actually managed to make Clint laugh a handful of times. Particularly when Phil sticks his head out the door because they all know they’d get in trouble if they got caught running in the street or in Clint’s case running at because of his broken ribs. Because of that it turned into a game within a game that was going great until Bucky punted the ball into the tree in their front yard.
“Bucky! That’s the third ball this month! We only have one left,” Natasha groans while looking up into the tree.
“I-I can get it,” Clint throws out real quick only to be met by three unimpressed looks.
“Yeah sure you can, runt. Don’t know if you’ve noticed but this tree is a bit taller than I don’t know all of us?!” Bucky says with a snort.
“I’m a good climber,” Clint says under his breath a bit as he begins to analyze the tree to see where the best angle to climb it would come from.
Just as Bucky was about to make another sarcastic comment, though, Clint begins to scale the tree as if he were a squirrel– easily being able to find a grip on the areas that should be impossible. He makes it to the first branch quick enough, and from there the climb upwards was a piece of cake. Soon enough one ball was being dropped from the tree followed by another and finally the remaining ball that had gotten stuck more towards the top of the tree.
With everyone being distracted by Clint in the tree, no one was keeping an eye on the door which is why no one noticed Phil pop his head out. Followed by no one noting that he began to make his way out of the house and approach them.
“Um, guys, where is Clint?” Phil asks in a slight panic. “And what are you looking at?”
All three heads are quick to snap to Phil with panicked expression which causes Phil to tilt his head up to look up the tree.
“Clinton Barton, get down from there right now!” Phil all but shouts causing for Sam as well as the other staff members on hand right now to come running out.
Clint could clearly hear the anger in Phil’s voice, but for some reason he chose that the best move would be to come down. So slowly, he maneuvers himself around the branches. As he was dangling from the last branch, ready to scale the trunk down the rest of the way, he finds hands grabbing his hips and pulling him the rest of the way down. As he’s placed onto solid ground he finds that it was– obviously– Phil who had grabbed him and the man was now crouched down to be at eye level with the most serious expression Clint had seen in the 48 hours he’d been in the house.
“Clint, what were you thinking?! You have a fractured wrist and two broken ribs! What made you think this was a good decision?!” Phil seethes out, though, his volume wasn’t anywhere near shouting.
“I-I’m good at climbing,” Clint says quietly, eyes not meeting the man. “We got the football stuck.”
“Did it not cross your guy’s mind to call me?” Phil now directs the question to everyone.
When no one answers he runs a hand across his face before pointing towards the house which did not require any verbal command for the kids to know they were to go inside. Clint was particularly strategic as he made his way inside to never have an adult out of his peripheral vision, which Phil couldn’t help but cringe at because he doesn’t want Clint to be scared of them.
“No more TV this afternoon for you four. Either be in the family room or your room. We’ll talk about this later in your one-on-ones,” Phil directs.
The other three are quick to do as they’re told, however, Clint’s internal fear has him frozen in to his spot. It seems as though Phil notices this, though, because soon enough there’s a gentle hand being placed on his shoulder that Clint can’t help but flinch back from.
“Clint, bud, are you okay?” Phil says in a way that makes Clint’s stomach hurt for some reason.
“I’m sorry,” the boy can’t help but mumble.
He has no idea why he’s actually apologizing because no one’s ever cared when he’s climbed things before, but Phil seems genuinely mad about it.
“Clint, I’m not mad at you, okay? I was just very scared to see you so high up in the tree; that’s really dangerous and you and your body are still on the mends. I was scared, not mad, okay?”
Phil smiles when Clint nods his head before once again grabbing the boy’s hand.
“Come on, we’re gonna go talk with Sam about you and school, okay?”
As Clint’s led into the kitchen he finds Sam sitting at the dining table with a cup of coffee in front of him with a small smile perched on his lips.
“Sup’ Spider-Man,” Sam jokes as he pulls a chair out for Clint to sit in. “You ready to review your exams?”
“I guess,” Clint mumbles as he folds his arms on top of the table and places his head down on top of his hands.
“Tell me this Clint, what was the last grade of school that you remember finishing?”
“Um, I think, uh, third grade? No, um, fourth?” Clint says unsure. “I’m not really sure.”
“That’s okay, but based on that you actually did very well on your placement tests,” Sam says with a smile.
“Really?!” Clint can’t help but asks in a manner of excitement.
“Yeah, buddy. You’ve got a big brain up there,” Phil says this time.
“I’m letting you know now, you’re gonna fit in great with Tony and Bruce because you are a little math wiz,” Sam adds in.
“Do you teach Bruce and Tony?” Clint asks curiously because they don’t seem like the type to have a tutor.
“Not exactly, but I’ve known them for quite some time. You see I used to be part of this program. I was one of Phil’s first wards actually. And then once I graduated I went to college, got my degree in education which is why I can act as a teacher to you guys, and now I’m getting my social work masters so I can become a bigger part here.”
“That’s cool, um, so what-what grade am I supposed to be in?”
“So there’s a couple answers to that. At your age you fall to being in either sixth or seventh grade because your birthday puts you on the cusp of either grade. Based on your tests scores, though, overall we’re right now at about a fifth grade testing level on average, however, this isn’t across the board.
“On topics like math and physics, you’re above average– specifically when you verbalize the answer. For science and history, you fall around average. However, where you struggle is the literature and grammar topics. Because of this you had some difficulties with the school’s exam, but when you verbalized things on our exam you were able to show you do know and understand concepts,” Sam says.
“M’not good at reading, the letters move around a lot,” Clint mumbles while looking at the paper.
“That’s another thing I noticed with your writing. You know, there’s a name for that right?”
“Stupid?” Clint answers quite seriously that has both Sam and Phil immediately shaking their heads.
“No, not at all,” Phil jumps in. “It’s something called dyslexia. It makes reading and writing difficult because you flip what letters and numbers look like. But luckily there are ways to help with this.”
“Phil’s right,” Sam adds. “And that’s what we’re gonna do together, okay? I think for the remainder of this semester you’re gonna work with me, and then come January we’ll see if we can move you into the school. We’ll work on reading and writing probably a bit more than other topics, but you’ll still get all your basic classes, too. I think this week we’ll just get to know each other and do a bit more messing around to see exactly where you are in certain topics, and then next week we’ll start on a more structured schedule. This sound good?”
“Sounds good.”