Clint’s “work” friends never thought of his as a farmer, but he actually loved being one.
His work life was hectic, more so than anyone else’s. It was full of blood and sweat and tears and exhaustion. So much exhaustion... which made him want to give it up all together every time he reached for another arrow. He would always ask himself what he was doing there. A guy who happens to have good aim with arrows shouldn’t have a place amongst geniuses or super soldiers or LITERAL GODS. Yet, he was there for every fight, to the point where he somehow became a recruiter to their team because he was an “expert” on heroes.
He didn’t feel like a hero expert. He felt tired.
Which was exactly why he loved farming.
There wasn’t chaos in farming. It was about life, but not in a life-or-death matter. He could see his family as a farmer. It was calm and everything Clint needed.
Well, almost everything.
His farm was away from chaos, which meant it was away from his friends. As much as Clint hated his line of work, he loved the friends he made along the way and missed them deeply when he was at the farm: Tony, the dumbass genius; Bruce, with strong emotions; Steve, the beefcake; Thor, the god of a hammer and Natasha. Especially Natasha. She was his best friend.
She was the only one who truly knew him in the Avengers. Natasha was the first person he had introduced Laura to after he had decided he wanted to marry her. He hadn’t proposed to Laura yet, and he definitely hadn’t told anyone about this decision but Natasha didn’t need his words to know it. She had only said, “Don’t wait too long.” after they had dropped Laura back home at the end of the day. He had proposed to Laura the next day.
Natasha was also the one who came with him on the day he had bought the farm. He had loved the garden and Natasha had liked the hardwood floors and the thick walls that made it easier for SHIELD to reinforce with metal. After he agreed on the house, the pair had gone along and bought a dozen chickens.
It was Natasha’s idea to name the chickens after them.
One of the chickens kept running around looking for a fight and she had immediately named it Steve. After that, it was only natural the rest of the team got a chicken named after them. The one that had the puffiest feathers when angered was Bruce, the one that kept sitting on the toolbox was Thor and the one that made the most noise was Tony. There was also Nick, Coulson, Maria and a couple more agents. There was also Natalia and Clint, which were named by the other. Natasha had named the chicken that didn’t like moving Clint and Clint had named the dark feathered chicken that constantly kept running around Natalia.
Those were the simpler days.
Things went south after that. The invasion, the accords, the robot, the superpowered twins... With every passing year, it only got weirder. With every passing year, the relationship between his friends got more complicated.
He still got on with Natasha though, even when they fought because of the Accords. That small fight was nothing compared to how their lives were and what they had faced together.
That didn’t mean he didn’t get angry.
He yelled at the chickens Tony and Steve for an hour after the Accords fight. He had grumbled at Natalia for hurting his arm and told chicken Thor to come and fix this mess.
He stayed at home for a long time after that, which wasn’t exactly his choice but he wasn’t complaining. He had missed the calm farmer life. He would spend time with Laura, play with the kids and look after the house. When he missed Natasha, he would have a one-sided chat with Natalia, which was witnessed by his youngest son Nathaniel a couple of times. It was nice.
But then Laura and the kids disappeared.
For some time, he didn’t know what to do. When he eventually did, he went into the barn to get his bow and arrow from his hiding spot, which made him realize a decent number of his chicken--which, by this time, had grown into a flock of more than fifty chicken with ridiculous names such as T’Challa-- had disappeared. He had to grit his teeth and looked away, trying his best not to check if the chicken that had his teammates’ names had disappeared.
It all became a blur after he left the farm. The person he used to be, the wannabe farmer who hung out with heroes in his spare time morphed into a ruthless murderer. He didn’t feel himself change, but to be honest he didn’t feel anything. He felt empty, and days and weeks and months became a giant blur.
Until he saw her again. After all that time, he finally felt something when he sensed her standing behind him, finding out she was alive. It wasn’t happiness, he doubted he would ever feel happy again, but the feeling was close enough to it. Natasha pulled him back to the team, even if he didn’t deserve it. We found something, she said on the way back to meet the team, a chance, maybe.
He didn’t want to have hope. He shouldn’t have had hope. With all those years he spent as a fighter and a farmer, he should have known the “you reap what you sow” rule. Yet, he let himself get carried away with the hope of everything becoming normal again, forgetting the mistakes he made and the lives he took.
Clint couldn’t cry after Vormir.
He cried as Natasha fell and as he held the soul stone, but didn’t cry after that. He got choked up during the funeral, too, but he was more angry than sad. And as much as he hated to say it, there were more pressing matters than grieving. With the stones and the purple demon wreaking havoc in the time and space he didn’t belong, Clint had no choice but to put a brave face.
In the same hour he got his Laura back, he lost Tony. At this point, he was back to feeling nothing because of the overwhelming events of saving the world. He knew at the back of his mind that he was sad, but he couldn’t get himself to accept it, let alone react to it.
He couldn’t cry.
Not at Tony’s funeral, not when he saw Laura and the kids again, not for months. He eventually went back to his house (which was still being looked after by a couple of SHIELD agents posing as his neighbor ever since before he left to be Ronin) started living a calm farmer’s life with his family again, far far away from everything his old job brought.
Then one day, early in the morning, Nathaniel called him down to the barn. Clint was sleepy, hungry, and slightly grumpy from being woken up so early as he walked towards his son, who had his back turned. But before Nathaniel could move to let him see, Clint caught a glimpse of the familiar dark feathers in front of his son and froze.
He was already falling on his knees as Nathaniel moved to let him see the dead bird that had almost the same name as his son.
And Clint Barton, after months of feeling nothing, started sobbing.