Notes:
Yes, this is supposed to only be one chapter. I am, with the encouragement of my wonderful and amazing beta, Kacie, trying a new thing... I am posting my first one shot.
Inspired by the absolute crack that is our editing sessions. Thank you Kacie for encouraging the insanity that lives in my brain... though I think the lobster idea was actually totally on you.
Love!
When Darcy's Away
It had been four weeks. Clint kicked his feet up over the back of the couch in the common room; the end of an old, broken arrow spinning loosely between his fingers as he listened to the quiet chatter of voices around him. Four weeks since his girlfriend had skipped off with her best friend to attend science conferences. Four long weeks of trying to force his brain to turn off by himself, of lonely nights, and no one to make the coffee machine make the perfect pot. He fucking missed her just smiling at him for no reason. Okay, usually the reason was that he tripped over something, or shut his coat in the door, or came home with wet shoes and missing one glove, but they were the best smiles.
He spun the arrow over his palm, his head hung down over the front cushions of the couch, while he studiously ignored the news on television, a deep sigh bubbling from the depth of his chest.
"You know what, Bird boy," Tony jumped off the couch and vaulted over the back, grabbing his StarkPad as he went. "No more moping." His fingers flew over the screen of his pad as Clint let his head drop back down, trying to ignore the annoying billionaire, too. "Avenger's dinner, tonight," Tony pushed Clint's feet off the back of the couch with a flourish. "Dress clothes required."
"Tony," the archer rolled off the couch, the whine in his voice unintentional, but nearly permanently present when the mechanic and his stupid schemes, team bonding included, were involved. "I don't want to find my tux," he ran a hand through his hair, the greasy locks sticking up all over the place.
"Yeah, shower too, hot shot," Tony raised a brow. "Darcy would be appalled if she could see you now."
"Darcy wouldn't give a shit," Clint scoffed, throwing the broken arrow, that said girlfriend had been bugging him to toss for months, into the nearest trashcan. "She is absolutely a believer in grungy days, and today is grungy Friday."
"Its Tuesday, Clint," Natasha rolled her eyes and watched as Tony pointed his tablet at her, his eyebrow still raised. "And grungy Friday has been going on for the last two weeks, and it's gross, and you smell."
"Why are we picking on me?" he opened the common room fridge with possibly a little more force than necessary, causing the bottles on the door to rattle threateningly, and pulled out a bottle of electric blue sports drink.
"Cause you are moping like a fifteen year old girl cause your girlfriend is off having fun, and you're stuck here without any missions to keep you entertained," Natasha caught the drink he lobbed at her head with ease, cracking it open and taking a sip. "And cause you're so easy."
"Fuck you very much, Tash," Clint took a long drink of the Powerade , flicking the Widow off the entire time. "I'm going home."
"Dinner's at six," Tony called after him. "I expect a tie!" Clint saluted him with a vicious middle finger as the elevator doors closed.
Friday reminded him six times about the upcoming dinner. Not that he needed her to, he knew how Tony was when he got an idea in his head. Clint knew he wasn't getting out of it. He had even pulled out his tux, hanging it in the bathroom while he showered in hopes of getting at least some of the wrinkles out. Friday was just a pain in the ass, and her childish lilting Irish brogue made him feel all kinds of dirty and wrong when she talked to him in the bathroom. He couldn't get the picture of her being some oversexed post-teen out of his head. He absolutely blamed his amazingly perverted girlfriend for that image, too.
"Agent Barton," the AI said, nearly causing Clint to fall over as his feet scrambled on the wet tiles of the shower, his hand going over his heart. "The boss asked that I remind you that dinner will be at six. I see you have found your tuxedo, that will please the boss."
"Get the fuck out of my bathroom," he growled, resisting the urge to try and cover himself from her electronic gaze.
"I believe I have stated before," Friday's voice continued to grate at the last nerves that the archer was barely holding on to. "I am not corporeal, and as such, I am not in your bathroom."
"Turn off all the cameras in my suite," he ground out from between clenched teeth. "I will be at dinner at six as requested. Tell your boss that he doesn't have to keep reminding me."
"I cannot do that," the AI replied. "But I would be happy to enact privacy mode, if you would like."
Clint resisted the urge to bang his head against the wall. "What does that entail?"
"It would prevent the recording of any and all things happening within your living quarters."
"How is that not already in place!"
"You have not asked, Agent Barton," came the disembodied voice of Tony's creepy as fuck artificial intelligence.
"I'm asking now," he growled, his hands smacking against the tiles of his shower. "Enact privacy mode indefinitely."
"Privacy mode has been enacted," the AI's voice seemed to fade away, and Clint let out a long slow breath, turning the shower up hotter.
The entirety of the Avengers, at least those who were in town, had gathered in their Sunday best around the island counter of the common room, watching as Steve, wearing an apron over his dark blue suit, boiled water.
"You have got to be joking," Clint rolled his shoulders and looked down into the crate that sat on the counter next to the stove. "Hey lobsters."
"They're dinner," Natasha smacked his hand as he reached in to pick one up. "No touching."
"They're going into a pot of boiling water, Tash," he pulled his hand away from her, and reached in with the other, picking one up. "I thought lobsters where red."
"Only after they're boiled," Tony told him, a highball glass full of amber liquid held in one hand. "They turn red when their done."
"Actually," Steve started, pouring a healthy amount of salt into the huge pot on the stove.
"We don't care, Spangles," Tony threw back the alcohol in his glass, swallowing it all in one go. "We don't need a lesson on culinary delights with dinner, just boil the water."
"Bucky wants to know," Steve countered, raising a brow at his best friend where the soldier was leaning against the counter at Natasha's hip. "Don't you, Buck?"
"Not really," Bucky took a long drink of his beer, raising a brow back at Steve. "Why are we all waiting for the water to boil anyhow?"
"It's part of the experience," Tony's glass was full again. "We're bonding, and more importantly, we are keeping Hawkboy from moping around, and not showering."
"I showered," Clint set the lobster he had liberated on the counter, watching as it made its way down towards Bucky, before apparently thinking better of it, and turning right back around. "I even used that scrubby brush thing that Darcy's always telling me helps exfoliate, or whatever."
"You loofa'd?" Steve smirked, turning up the heat under the pot. The fucking thing was as big as a bathtub, it was going to be like an hour before it boiled. "Oh man."
"Shut your trap," he picked up the lobster, who clearly was a higher form of intelligence, being skittish of the Winter Soldier and Natasha, and took it into the livingroom. "You don't know what you're missing, it was like the best back scratch ever."
"I'm telling Darcy you said that," Natasha grinned stealing Bucky's beer and taking a sip. "So, are we having anything else with the lobster, or is that it?" She peered into the crate to count the crustaceans. "Cause a lobster a piece is not going to be enough."
"I've got corn and potatoes coming," Tony waved away the question. "Along with dessert."
"Do we ask why he's got the rest coming, and we have to wait for this shit to cook?" Bucky asked Natasha, stealing back his beer. "Or do we just let it go, and chalk it up to Stark being crazy?"
"We shut our trap, Robocop," Tony snapped at the former Winter Soldier. "You sit there and be happy I let you live in my tower, drink my beer, and eat my food."
"Beer's mine," Steve wiped his hands off on a dish towel that he set over his shoulder. "And I thought were past all this."
"Guess we aren't," Tony drained his second glass and turned to refill it.
"So," Clint put his new lobster friend down on the glass topped coffee table, looking the creature in what he assumed where its eyes. "I'm Clint, you got a name, dude?"
"Dinner," Natasha supplied from the kitchen.
"Don't mind her," he whispered to his friend. "She's just cranky cause she hasn't eaten yet."
"Do not make friends with dinner, Barton," Bucky called from next to the Widow, his arm winding around the woman's waist, his nose nuzzling into her neck. "We plan on eating that thing."
"He's a crank too," Clint told the lobster. "I'm going to call you Sebastian. It's good to meet you, Sebastian."
"Sebastian was a crab," Steve supplied, sitting down with the others, who were all watching Clint sitting on the floor in the living room, legs crossed, looking at the probably bewildered lobster.
"Shut up, Captain Smartypants," the archer waved him away, his eyes watching as Sebastian's little legs skittered across the glass table.
"Water's boiling, punk," Bucky pushed his friend off the stool he had been sitting on. "Come on, I'm fucking starving, I was under the impression we were getting fed at six."
"You're always hungry," Steve grumbled, grabbing two of the lobsters and dropping them in the pot before picking up two more. The lobsters in the pot made a horrible noise, but Steve just dropped the next two in.
"Are they screaming?" Clint looked over at the pot in horror, picking up his new friend carefully, trying to shield him from the murder of his compatriots.
"It's just steam escaping from their shells," Natasha rolled her eyes and made a grab for his lobster. "Come on, it's dinner time."
"Nope," Clint turned , the crustacean still in his arms. "Not happening, Sebastian and I are going to eat mac and cheese, and try and recover from your blatant disregard for lobster life." He turned towards the elevators just as the car arrived, a ding sounding, and the rest of dinner arriving with a put upon Happy holding the bags. "Say no to crustacean murder, dude," the archer slipped into the open elevator and pushed the button for his floor. "Good night."
It took some google searching, but Clint found Sebastian a nice tank and filtration system to keep him happy and healthy. His apartment smelled a little briny, but Clint just shrugged it off. He smelled much worse when he didn't shower, and Darcy only complained sometimes, so she probably wouldn't mind. The lobster wasn't the world's best pet. You couldn't snuggle it or take it for walks, and petting was mostly out of the question, especially once Clint cut off the rubber bands that held its pincers closed, but it was better than sitting alone in his apartment with no one to talk to, and nothing to do.
"How does another episode of Dog Cops sound, Bastian?" Clint laid out on his couch, his phone on his chest as he waited patiently for his girlfriend to let him know that she and Jane had made it safely to their next hotel. He shouldn't worry, they had Thor with them, but there had been an attempted kidnapping almost a year earlier and it was always in the forefront of his mind when she was gone for long periods of time and it had been six weeks.
"I think Dog Cops sounds like a solid plan," the archer answered for the silent crustacean. He rolled off the couch, depositing his phone on the coffee table and made for the kitchen, and a beer. "Beer, nachos and Dog Cops, solid evening." He had just twisted the cap off his beer, and made himself comfortable on the couch again when his phone sounded, and it wasn't Darcy's ring. "Come on, man," he looked down at the phone flashing a call to Assemble on the screen in bright red. "I just fucking sat down."
Clint dumped the beer in the sink with a mournful look, and grabbed his keys. He stopped at the next apartment over to see Bucky leaving, pulling his coat on over his cybernetic arm. "You too?" the former Winter Soldier asked.
"Yeah, Tash coming?" he asked, peeking around the still open door to where Natasha was lounging on the couch, feet up on the armrest.
"Nope," Bucky shrugged.
"Tell the Cap, I'll be right up," Clint tripped around the door to Bucky and Natasha's apartment. "Gotta ask Tash something."
"Sure thing," Bucky closed the door behind him.
"Hey best friend?" the archer dropped down on the couch next to Natasha, who just cocked an eyebrow at him. "You think you can do me a favor and watch Sebastian for me? All you gotta do is feed him once a day, and you know, like talk to him and stuff."
"You want me to watch the lobster you liberated from dinner two weeks ago?" she asked, running a hand through her hair, before settling her arms under her head. "Seriously? Isn't enough, enough?"
"He's my friend," Clint crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the former Red Room assassin. "Please?"
"Fine," Natasha rolled her eyes, and punched his leg. "I'll watch him for a couple of days, but after that, bets are off," she pushed at his legs, dislodging him from his perch on the couch. "Go, Steve's waiting."
"Thanks Tash!"
Clint stumbled into his apartment, five days of laying on a rooftop in a third-world South American country, the heat index well over a hundred, had sapped every ounce of water from his body, and yet he felt like he was soaked completely through. His nose was burned, his hair was crispy, and he felt like he was completely covered in sand. He dropped his go bag on the floor just inside the door and leaned against the wall, rolling his neck until it cracked loudly, echoing through the front hall.
"Oh hey," Natasha called from the kitchen. "I was starting to wonder when you all where going to get back," an ominous crack came from the same direction as her voice, followed by a metallic click on the marble counter of his kitchen.
Clint looked into the living room where Sebastian's tank sat empty on the bookshelf. "Where's my lobster, Tash," he rounded the corner to find his best friend sucking the meat out of one of Sebastian's claws. "Murderer," he breathed out. "Really? I ask you to watch my pet and you ate him?"
"He was always going to be dinner, Clint," she dumped the empty shells into the trash and brushed a kiss against his cheek as she grabbed her coat. "Have a nice night."
"Mean," he looked down at the collection of broken shells in the trash bin as the apartment door slammed shut behind the Widow. He sagged against the counter trying not to look at the empty tank in the living room, but the stupid filter made a gurgling sound. "Fuck."
The hot water of the shower helped Clint start to feel a little more human. The water had stopped looking a muddy brown around the third time he scrubbed his hair, and Darcy's loofa did wonders for the nasty sandy feeling that permeated every inch of his skin, even between his toes. It did not wash away the fact that his best friend had eaten his lobster, after saying she would watch it.
He rubbed a towel over his head and pulled his phone out and dialed his girlfriend, turning the speaker on and tossing it on the bed.
"Hey sexy," Darcy's smile filtered through the speakers, laughter in her voice. "Miss me yet?"
"Yeah, babe," Clint threw himself down on the bed, the towel loose around his hips. "I miss you plenty. When you getting home?"
"Real soon," she said, pausing for a moment. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," he sighed, rubbing his heels of his hands into his eye sockets. "Nothing's wrong."
"Lies," his girlfriend accused. "Vicious and terrible lies."
"Nat ate Sebastian," Clint relented, letting his arms fall to his sides as he stared up at the ceiling. "I had to go out on a call, and she ate him."
"Natasha ate your pet lobster?"
"Yep," he sighed again, closing his eyes. "I know he wasn't the best pet or anything, but it's been way too quiet without you here."
"I hear that," Darcy agreed. "It gets too quiet when your gone, too."
"When did you say you were getting home?" Clint turned over and looked at the display on hi phone, the seconds of the call ticking by as he watched.
"Soon, baby," she smiled. "Real soon."
"Good," he nodded. "I'm going to pass out, I'll call you later."
"Sleep well," the phone beeped signaling the end of the call. Clint pulled a blanket over his head and let his eyes drift closed.
Clint woke to soft fingers carding through his hair, the warm scent of his girlfriend's lavender shampoo tickling at his nose. He groaned and rolled over, cuddling his head on her lap and blinking his eyes open. "That was fast," he said as she smiled down at him. "Thought you had another conference at the end of the week."
"Jane canceled," Darcy shrugged, never stopping the movements of her fingers against his scalp. "We both wanted to come home more than we wanted to sit through another lecture on astrophysics in a language neither of us spoke."
"Eyes getting all squinty from reading subtitles?" the archer pulled her down to him, capturing her lips between his in a slow kiss.
"Mmm, I missed that," she whispered against his lips, her tongue flicking out to rub against his bottom lip. "Yeah, brain freeze is not just for ice cream anymore."
"Well, now that you're home," he pushed himself up on his elbows, looking her up and down. She was wearing an old pair of jeans and one of his Shield shirts with his old leather bomber jacket over it, her chucks dangling off the bed. "Let's get you out of those clothes, I want a proper greeting."
"Hold that though," Darcy lifted one finger as she slid off the bed. "First," she disappeared around the door to the bedroom. "I brought you a present," when she came back in the room she had a ridiculously floppy eared puppy in her arms. "I thought he could keep us both company." She set the dog down on the bed, and he wobbled over to Clint, collapsing against the archer, his slobbery tongue bathing Clint's entire face and most of his chest. "His name is Lucky, he's a pitbull, and he was rescued from a dog fighting ring when he was only a few days old."
"He's perfect," Clint pulled the squirming pup into his lap, scratching him behind the ears. "I love you, babe."
"Love you too, sexy," Darcy kicked off her shoes and dropped his jacket on the floor, hopping up on the bed to join them. "Sebastian will be missed, but Lucky's a better choice."
"I'm still boycotting all lobster dinners," he pulled his girlfriend under his arm as the puppy danced between them trying to find the most comfortable spot. "So don't expect any fancy seafood dinners in our future."
"Eh," she shrugged, cuddling up to both Clint and the dog. "I'm a greasy burger joint kinda girl anyhow," she kissed his cheek. "And I heard somewhere that the four most overrated things in life are champagne, lobster, anal sex, and picnics."
"I have it on good authority that you enjoy anal," the archer raised a brow and pinched her side, causing her to laugh.
"Only when you bottom, baby," Darcy stole a quick kiss from his lips and pulled the dog into her lap. "Get dressed, we need to take Lucky for a walk before he gets too excited and pees."
Notes:
Please leave love... Clint and Darcy would really appreciate it.