A/N:Just something I thought up. I hope you like it. :)
Clint practically ignores the four other team members on the quinjet in favour of half dragging Natasha down the ramp and guiding her towards the house. He just trusts that the rest of the guys will follow. Nat is leaning on him far too heavily for Clint to not be significantly worried about her.
"Almost there." He tells her, helping her up the porch steps, and the fact that she doesn't so much as glare at him, says a huge amount about the magnetude of effect Wanda Maximoff has had on her.
He calls out to Laura as they enter the house, and his wife emerges from around the corner with a handful of Lila's craft supplies and a familiar expression of concern. It quickly morphs into one of elation and she takes a few quicker steps to engulf both him and Nat in a tight hug.
"Sorry." Clint mumbles against her shoulder, one arm still around Natasha now trapped between them. "Company. Should have called."
Naturally, Laura ignores him and pulls back to assess the damage. It should be disturbing how many memories Clint has of similar returns home where Laura has scanned over him and Nat to make sure they're both in one piece. As it happens, he finds the whole ceremony comforting and when Laura kisses him gently on the lips he finds himself smiling properly for the first time in a while.
The smile is quickly wiped from his face, however, when Laura reaches a concerned hand out to Natasha's cheek and his partner makes an uncharacteristic little whimper that has Clint tightening her arm around her. Out of the corner of his eye, Clint sees Tony and Cap exchanging worried looks.
Laura keeps her hand on Natasha's cheek, and with her other, takes one of Nat's hands and presses a kiss to her fingers. "Something happened." She says, and Natasha's bottom lip trembles. "Oh, sweetheart. You're home now."
Natasha's breathing stutters and Clint can feel it under the palm of his hand where it rests around her ribs. Natasha doesn't cry often. Nat gets mad, and throws things, and screams, and punches walls, but the amount of times Clint has seen her cry in all of the years he's known her could be counted on less than a hand. Now, though, he honestly thinks she might just break.
But then the kids come thundering down the stairs and Cooper grins, shouting, "Dad!" and ignoring the superheroes standing awkwardly in his living room. Cooper has his side pressed against Clint's and a hand stretched over his Auntie Nat's waist before Lila even makes it to the bottom of the stairs.
Clint supposes he should maybe feel a little put out that his only daughter's face lights up when she sees, not him, but her favourite aunt, and sprints towards Nat, but he doesn't. He loves how much his children love Nat.
That love however, right at this moment needs to be curbed because Nat can barely stand on her own, and so Clint has to practically snatch Lila out of the air as she throws herself at her aunt.
"Daddy!" Lila giggles and kisses him on the cheek. "You're back."
"I am." He grins at her, keeping half an eye on Nat to make sure she won't fall when he's got both arms around Lila. "Did you miss me?"
"Yeah." She grins.
Cooper tugs on his elbow. "I missed you more, Dad." He has a glint in his eyes that betrays his intentions to rile up his little sister.
It works.
"Nuh-uh." Lila huffs. "I missed Daddy and Auntie Nat way more than you, Cooper."
Cooper chuckles and sticks his tongue out at her. Clint laughs at them. He's distracted enough by his children that it takes him longer than it should to realise that Laura is attempting to guide Natasha to the arm of the couch as the spy wavers from foot to foot. She's gone a frightening grey colour and Steve rushes forward to catch her under the arms before she falls to the ground.
"Auntie Nat?" Lila squirms in Clint's arms and he puts her down. She tries to get to her aunt but Cooper, ever the child to sense when something's going on, holds her back. She fights him a little but one look from Laura keeps her silenced.
Natasha frowns and smacks at Steve to let her go. He's supporting practically all of her weight, so Cap looks to Clint questioningly and they switch out, although Clint holds his partner in a decidedly more comfortable manner.
"Okay?" He asks Nat and she shakes her head. Lip quivering again. "Okay, alright." Clint takes the initiative and scoops Natasha up into his arms bridal style. She pushes her nose into his chest and he kisses her forehead.
"Take her to bed." Laura says, stroking back some of the red hair by Nat's eyes. She kisses her temple gently, like she does to the kids when she doesn't want to wake them, and waves Clint up the stairs.
He ignores the concerned looks they're getting from the rest of the Avengers as he passes, and hears Lila's little voice as he carries Natasha up the stairs.
"Is Auntie Nat okay?" Lila asks.
"She's just not feeling well." Clint hears Laura explain.
He can still hear dull tones of the voices downstairs when he gently lays Natasha in his side of the bed. She's not asleep, but her eyes are closed and she curls onto her side like she does when she's in a deep sleep. Clint sits on the edge of the bed next to her and strokes her hair. Natasha reaches up and holds his hand, pulling it to her chest like a cuddly toy.
"I'm going to need that back." Clint tells her quietly. "I kinda use that hand a lot."
The corner of her mouth twitches. "Nope." She says. "Mine now."
He chuckles and lets her hug his arm for a little longer before he pulls it back and starts stroking the tops of her cheeks with his thumb. "Tasha." Clint whispers, gently touching the tips of her eyes lashes with the pad of his fingers. "Tasha. You don't need to tell me what she made you see, but it's over now, okay? You're home. Over now."
Her eyes blink open, and she looks up at him with such a haunting gaze that Clint wants to skin every last one of those bastards that ever made his Tasha feel this way. And he doesn't mean Ultron's little pet twins, because as much as they, particular the girl, are responsible for Nat's current state, they're still just kids blindly following orders. No, the people Clint really wants to hurt are the people who made the Black Widow, the people who forced a little girl to kill and took away everything she had that was ever her own. Those are the people she would like to see suffer.
"I tell you everything." Natasha says. And Clint doesn't doubt it. Maybe at one time he would have been lucky for her to tell him what her favourite colour was (green, although she likes to tell people it's black), but now, she really did tell them everything. All Laura had to do was ask, and Nat would talk.
"You understand, though," Clint says, and then kisses her head, "that you don't have to if you don't want to. Whatever she made you see…" He trails off because he can't even describe how frightening it had been to see her like that.
She pulls the fleece blanket on the pillow below her cheek around so that she can press it under her nose. Natasha takes a few breaths with the blanket covering her nose and mouth then pulls it away. "The graduation ceremony." She says with no emotion and Clint's heart sinks into the pit of his stomach. "That's what I saw."
"Sweetheart." He endears, and pulls her up until she's practically in his lap and he's got both arms firmly around her. "It's okay, Tash. It's not-," He stops himself before he call tell her that it's not 'real', because of course, it is, or it was. "
Natasha tries to grip onto his shirt like she has a habit of doing when she's upset, only to realise that he's still wearing his tack suit. She whines a little pathetically and tucks her head under his chin.
"Oh, sweetheart." It's an endearment that is almost exclusively Laura's to use for Natasha, but she's so not herself right now that Clint thinks the words might be more comforting than his usual 'kid' or 'red'.
Natasha lets Clint hug her and doesn't complain when he helps her change out of her tack suit and into some sweats. She doesn't put up a fight when he tucks her into bed and kisses her 'goodnight' in the middle of the afternoon, and he can tell just from the way her mouth opens slightly and the sound of her breathing, that she's actually asleep. Clint gives her one last kiss after he gets changed into some jeans and flannel, before going back downstairs.
It's an odd sight that greets him on arrival in the lower floor of the house. Thor and Cap have changed into the spare clothes they keep in the quinjet so they at least look a little more normal, but the two of them sitting at his kitchen table, dwarfing everything in a close proximity, makes Clint smirk a little.
"Hey." Clint says as he enters the room. Cap and Thor nod at him from the table and Bruce gives him a little smile from where he's standing in the doorway of the sunroom.
Laura looks over from where she's making sandwiches and it takes everything Clint has not to comment on the stereotype that makes him a little uncomfortable. Instead he crosses the room to help her and takes over the spreading of butter.
"She okay?" Laura askes quietly enough that Clint knows she's not intending for the others to hear.
Clint glances behind him at Cap and their eyes meet for a fraction of a second. "Super soldier hearing." Clint says to Laura and she nods in understanding.
"How is she?" Laura asks once more, this time at a more normal level now that she knows it's fruitless to attempt to hide anything from the team. "I haven't seen her that shaken up in a long time."
Clint puts some lettuce and tomatoes onto one of the sandwiches. "Ultron has these twins." He starts to explain, but Laura holds up her hand.
"Tony explained." She says. "The girl made them see things."
"Right." Clint sighs. He's put too much cheese on one of the sandwiches but adds it to the growing plate anyway. He grits his teeth. "She made Nat relive her graduation."
The horror on Laura's face reflects everything he's feeling.
"I know." Clint says. "She's asleep now, but we'll have to keep an eye on her."
Laura nods. She reaches up to kiss him, pats his cheek, and takes the pile of food to the kitchen table. Thor already has a sandwich and a half in his mouth when he mumbles a "Thank you". Cap looks kind of disgusted, but Laura just laughs and pats Thor on the shoulder because she's got two, almost three kids, and talking with your mouth full is just a normal day at Barton Farm.
"Where's Tony?" Clint asks when he looks around and can't see the billionaire lounging anywhere in his house.
Bruce leans back a little on the door to the sunroom, pushing it open enough that Clint hears Tony say, "So do you have, like, cows here?"
Laura has a hand covering her mouth while she sniggers. Clint bites his lip.
"Yeah." He hears Lila answer. "Six of 'em. They're called Lucy, and Charlotte, and Molly-,"
"Li, he's Iron Man," Cooper says, "He doesn't want to hear the names of the cows."
"He does, too. Me and Auntie Nat named them."
Cooper groans. "He doesn't care."
"Does so!" Lila argues.
"Does not!" Cooper says.
"So!"
"Not!"
"So!"
Their bickering continues and Laura gives him the 'when they fight they're your children' look, so Clint smiles apologetically at Bruce and slides through the door into the sunroom. Tony is sat in the middle of the floor surrounded by coloured paper and Lego, apparently completely unaffected by the two children squabbling on either side of him as he continues to fold something impressively intricate with an orange piece of paper.
"Kids." Clint says in his 'dad voice'. The children fall silent and both look over to him sheepishly. "Can you guys, not, right now?"
"Sorry, Dad." Cooper mumbles.
"Sorry, Daddy." Lila says.
He beckons both of them over with open arms. He hugs Cooper and picks up Lila and just makes the most of holding his children. Cooper's getting older though and as much as he's missed his Dad, the fact that Iron Man is in his playroom and is making origami ninja stars takes over his focus and he gives Clint one last squeeze before going to sit by Tony's side.
Lila stays with Clint, though, sticks to him like glue for the rest of the day and is uncharacteristically quiet over dinner. She answers Steve when he asks her about her drawing of Auntie Nat with a dinosaur on the fridge, and she happily plays on some game on the tablet while Clint and the team (minus Tasha and plus Laura) discuss their next move, but Lila is just a little off. And Clint thinks he knows exactly what it is.
His theory is proven correct when Laura mentions she's going upstairs to check on Natasha and for the first time that night Lila abandons Clint's side in order to stick to Laura's.
"I'll come, too." Lila says, tugging on Laura's tunic.
Laura pets her head. "No, sweet pea. You stay here with Daddy and Coop. I'll be back soon."
"No." Lila whines and it's an octave Clint knows will soon follow with a full-blown meltdown tantrum. "I wanna go see Auntie Nat." The bottom lip is quivering, and Clint is suddenly taken back to just a few hours ago when Auntie Nat looked very much like little Lila.
He sighs and walks over to Laura, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Go see Nat." He says to Laura, and before Lila can even get the first cry of anguish out of her mouth, Clint scoops her up in his arms and takes her out of the front door. He pokes his head back inside with another thought. "Coop, watch the superheroes. Make sure they behave."
Cooper grins at him and gives his dad a thumbs up. Tony flips Clint the bird.
Clint carries Lila all the way out to the barn, her screaming in his ear and squirming in his arms the whole way. He plonks her down on the seat of the broken tractor and takes a step back, giving her a levelling look.
"What would Auntie Nat say if she saw you behaving like that?" He asks his daughter.
Lila gasps over her breath a couple of times before wiping her teary eyes and looking down at him. "She-she would," the little girl hiccups, "she wouldn't say anything."
Clint nods, because that's exactly what Nat would do. He's been a dad for longer than she's been an aunt, but he's learnt some tricks from her, one of which was to ignore the kids when they were having a tantrum. Nat's good at it, too, and while it's never quite worked with Cooper who's always been a little more sensitive and mild-mannered, Lila hates being ignored by Tasha, and the tantrums tend to be over before they ever get the chance to get started.
Lila isn't crying anymore, but her breaths are still shaky enough that Clint knows if he pushes her a little too much, round two of her fit could begin at any time.
"Have you calmed down?" Clint asks after a few minutes.
Lila nods. "I'm sorry, Daddy."
He lifts her off the tractor and sits down on a crate with her on his lap. Lila puts her thumb in her mouth and Clint doesn't stop her even though he knows Laura has been trying to break her of the habit for almost a year. He kisses her head.
"I know you're worried about Natasha." He says, playing with one of her braids. "But being worried is no excuse for throwing a fit."
She cocks an eyebrow at him in a way that's so Nat it's not even funny. Lila takes her thumb out of her mouth. "You broke the deck when Auntie Nat was on the news."
Clint breathes heavily through his nose. That wasn't exactly how it had gone down after the fall of SHIELD, but there had been the data dump, and the live images of Nat running from the Winter Soldier, and then there had been the hellicarrier falling out of the sky and Nat hadn't called, or texted, or anything just to let him know she was even alive, and one night Cooper had innocently switched on the TV and they had been showing repeats of Natasha and Cap on the bridge and Clint had lost it.
He had stormed out of the house and kicked the crap out of a spindle on the porch. Natasha had turned up in the middle of the night, climbed into bed, and gone to sleep like she hadn't put the fear of God into him for weeks. Clint was so mad he could have killed her, instead he hugged her and kissed her and tucked her under blankets with Laura while he, Cooper, and Lila fixed the deck.
"You should try to be better than me." Clint tells Lila. "You saw me have a tantrum, and what happened? We had to fix something I broke."
Lila's sucking her thumb again so she doesn't speak, just nods. Her fingers on one hand fist into Clint's flannel shirt.
"You're a lot like Auntie Nat, you know." He says. "Auntie Nat will be okay, Li." Clint tells her.
She looks up at him with Laura's eyes and raises one eyebrow again just like Nat, and Clint hugs his daughter even tighter.
"What's the matter with her?" Lila asks around her thumb.
"She's hurting." Clint says, stroking up and down Lila's back. "In here." He taps Lila's hand to his chest, over his heart.
Lila frowns. "How do we make her better?"
"I think," Clint sighs, "we just have to give her a lot of love."
"I can do that." Lila says confidently. The thumb comes out.
"I know. I don't doubt it."
Clint and Lila only go back in the house when it starts to get uncomfortably cold in the barn and Lila is falling asleep in Clint's lap. She wakes up a little when he carries her out to the house, but keeps her head laid on his shoulder.
Laura's just handing Steve the blanket off the back of the couch when Clint uses his hip to open the front door. Cap gives him a little smile and waves at Lila before walking upstairs with the blanket under his arm.
"They all have places to sleep." Laura says, indicating the empty living room. "Everyone wanted an early night."
He hugs her tightly and kisses her in a way he hopes conveys his utter gratitude, because yes, he was tending to their little girl, but he also abandoned their guests with her and didn't really think about the fact that she would be left to organise sleeping arrangements for four grown superheroes. Laura seems to sense his inner thoughts because she gives him a peck and shakes her head. "Steve did mostly everything. I only pointed him in the direction of the guest rooms."
"Good old Cap." Clint smiles.
Laura's eyes fall on Lila, and she strokes a hand over the little girl's hair.
"Bedtime, I think." Laura says, and Lila just nods. Laura kisses her daughter and wishes her goodnight.
Clint carries Lila up to bed, puts her in pyjamas, tucks her in, and the little girl is fast asleep within four minutes of them walking through the front door. He leaves her bedroom with the door open a crack, and pokes his head in on Cooper. The kid is also asleep, arm wrapped around a stuffed alligator that he swears blind he is too old to care about. Clint leaves him and checks in on Nat. She's asleep, too, so he leaves her be and heads back downstairs to Laura.
…
It takes Lila less than five minutes to convince her Daddy that she's asleep. It's too easy really. Auntie Nat would be proud.
She keeps her eyes closed and waits until she hears his footsteps move down the hall and go all the way downstairs before she dares lift her head from the pillow. Lila takes it slow, gently easing herself out of bed and sneaking out of her room and down the hall. She has to avoid the creaky floorboards and tries to be extra quiet when she passes the room where Captain America is sleeping, but eventually, Lila finds herself standing outside of her Mommy and Daddy's bedroom door.
Auntie Nat is in there.
The door is open, but just a crack, so Lila can't see into the room but she can push the door open without having to turn the squeaky doorknob.
Auntie Nat doesn't wake up when Lila enters the room, she doesn't even wake up when Lila closes the door and it makes a 'click'. Daddy had said that Auntie Nat would be okay, but she doesn't seem okay. Lila can see her face peeking out from under the blanket. She's pale. Lila's never seen her like that.
Without any hesitation, Lila climbs into bed next to her aunt, snuggling close and lifting Nat's arm to wrap around her. The fingers on Nat's arm twitch and she opens her eyes with a flutter of lashes.
She seems to be confused for a moment until her eyes focus on Lila and her face relaxes. Lila reaches out to stroke her aunt's hair.
"Lila, what are you doing here?" Nat asks. Her voice sounds like she's got a sore throat and Lila notices the glass of water on her Daddy's nightstand.
She reaches over Auntie Nat to pick up the water, and gently pushes the straw against her lips. "Drink some." She instructs.
Nat smiles and takes a long drink. Lila only replaces the glass when she's sure her aunt is finished.
"Thank you, Lila." Auntie Nat says. Her voice is still raspy, but the good kind of raspy that makes Lila think about all of the stories her aunt has read to her over the years.
"I love you." She tells Auntie Nat. The woman looks a little startled at the sudden admission that she's heard hundreds of times before, so Lila decides to tell her again. "I love you, Auntie Nat." She kisses her auntie and pulls the blanket over them so that they can share.
"But, why?"
Lila stares at her aunt, perplexed, because how could she possibly list the millions of reasons she loves her so much? Lila blinks and decides to give the only answer she can.
"Because you're the best aunt I've ever had."
Auntie Nat smirks a little. "I'm the only aunt you've ever had."
"Yeah." Lila shrugs. "But if I could pick anyone in the whole universe to be my aunt, I'd still choose you."
"I wouldn't choose me." Auntie Nat says quietly. Her face is solemn.
"But, why?" Lila asks, parroting her own question back at her.
Auntie Nat frowns and her eyes seem to go dark. "I've done bad things, Lila. Things I'm disgusted of, things I hope you never find out."
Lila looks back her aunt. "I know." She puts a hand on her cheek. "But I don't care. You're my Auntie Nat and I love you no matter what."
Her Auntie Nat is crying, really quietly, but Lila can see the tears falling down her cheeks. She doesn't like it, but sometimes Mommy says having a good cry can make you feel better, so she doesn't tell her to stop.
Instead, Lila brushes away the tears as they come, and remembering her father's words from earlier, she gives her Auntie Nat lots and lots of love. Lila kisses her and cuddles her and pets her hair until her Auntie Nat's tears slow, and eventually stop falling.
"Are you feeling better?" Lila asks her.
Auntie Nat nods. "I am. You're too good to me." Her face is so close to Lila's that she can feel her breath warm on her cheeks.
Lila scrunches up her face. "No. I'm as good to you as you deserve. You deserve all the love."
Nat clears her throat and wraps her arms tighter around Lila. "I love you." She tells Lila. "You're fixing me, Li."
"No." Lila says, shaking her head. "You're not broken, Auntie Nat, you just," she pauses, searching for the right words, "you just got a little bruised." A physical bruise is peaking out from under Nat's t-shirt sleeve, and Lila gently brushes it. "I'll kiss you all better, though." She says and pecks the purple bruise. "Better?"
Auntie Nat is crying again, but this time she's smiling real big when she does. "Yeah. I'm better. Thank you, my little girl." She kisses Lila. "You deserve all the love, too."
They lie cuddling for a long time. Lila can hear the deep rumblings of the Avengers in various rooms of her house talking, but can't make out any words. The sounds are comforting, like when she gets scared of monsters but she can hear Mommy and Daddy laughing at a movie downstairs. Auntie Nat must think it's a good sound, too, because she falls asleep, curled up next to Lila with her nose in Lila's hair.
Lila's exhausted, but she keeps herself awake until Auntie Nat is asleep, just in case she needs to be told she's loved again. When Lila is sure that her aunt is in a deep slumber, she allows herself to close her eyes and drift off.
…
Clint and Laura don't end up going to bed until late. It takes longer than he anticipates to catch her up on all the Ultron stuff, and after that they talk about everything else for hours; Cooper's school, Lila's soccer, Nathaniel's new habit of kicking Laura awake every morning at four, Nat. They talk a lot about Nat.
Laura insists that she doesn't need any help getting up the stairs, but Clint can see the exhaustion from the day taking it's toll on her and he aids her ascent anyway. She doesn't complain, just leans into his side.
They make it to their bedroom door and as he's about to reach out and turn the doorknob, Laura puts a hand on his arm. It's then that Clint notices it, too.
"Did you close the door when you put Li to bed?" Laura whispers and Clint shakes his head.
"Left it open a crack."
Laura frowns at him. "I didn't hear her moving around."
Clint gives her a look to as if to say 'if Nat didn't want you to hear her move, you wouldn't', and Laura gives an accepting nod. They both stare at the closed for a moment.
Clint is trying to decide whether Nat would really be neglectful enough to run away and close the door when it had been open. In her younger days, Nat had been a runner, avoiding any sort of emotional contact by sprinting in one direction for as long as her body would let her, but they hadn't had to worry about her fleeing for years.
Laura takes the initiative and pushes past Clint to open their bedroom door. She takes a step into the room and then stops abruptly so Clint almost walks into the back of her. He's about to jump in front of her, prepared to fight, when he notices her reason for stopping, and it's not a threat in the slightest.
There, snuggled together in the middle of Clint and Laura's bed, covered in a purple fleece blanket, are Natasha and Lila. Nat has Lila hugged against her chest and the little girl has her thumb in her mouth and the other hand fisted in Nat's shirt. It's absolutely adorable.
Laura smiles at him and quietly begins getting ready for bed. Clint can't take his eyes off his daughter and his partner. They've always been close. Natasha's close with Cooper, too, but Lila was the first baby Nat had been there for when they were born and from the day Lila had been placed in her arms, the little girl had been her Auntie's girl, no doubt.
When they're ready, Clint climbs in on Lila's side and leaves the larger gap next to Natasha for Laura. His wife lies on her side, bump pressing into Natasha's back. Laura reaches over and strokes her hand over Lila's arm before pulling back and letting it rest on Nat's waist.
Clint is comfortable in bed. His aching joints settle nicely on the familiar mattress, and the comfort he gets at having his three most important girls safe and sound under his shelter is something that comforts him to no end. He thinks of Cooper, sound asleep and safe in his own room, and for a second everything is right with the world.
Nat mutters something without opening her eyes.
"What's that, sweetheart?" Laura asks in a whisper.
Nat turns her head minutely towards Laura. "I love home."
Clint stretches over Lila and threads his fingers with Laura's on Natasha's waist. "We love having you home, Tasha." He says.
Laura nods, nose brushing Nat's red curls. "Home's not home without Auntie Nat."
Clint couldn't agree more.
A/N: I was thinking of making a sequel with Nat and Cooper having some cute moments. Let me know if that's maybe something you'd want.
Review please. Let me know what you thought. :) xxx