Note: I don't own these characters. Or the film. Or the artwork. I only claim the execution of this piece.
I'd love to hear what you thought. Please send me a review when you're finished — even if you hated it.
"You should've killed me when you had the chance."
Clint turns to look at her, though she does not meet his glance. Her eyes pierce the wall in front of her. It is beige and windowless and adorned with a map of the United States — National Geographic, the states are edged with bright colors. The map she remembers studying in what some might consider her hometown was green and ridged, littered with hills and valleys and lakes and little red pins. Twice a week her mentor would come in and press pins into the landscape. He did not look at her, she did not ask questions. America, to her, was an abstract concept like good or evil or love. Smatterings of red dots across North America or Egypt or Cambodia rested in her periphery, at best.
She wonders if this organization, SHIELD, has a map like it. Is she red or green or blue?
Scanning the map in front of her, she finds New York, New York. She figures she is about here at present, give or take. She has not seen the outdoors for a while. Two days — or was it three?
The man stands up behind her and stretches out an arm, finger landing on the map towards the top in the middle.
"I'm from there. Iowa."
"I don't care," she snaps, digging her nails into the chair. If the chair was not metal, they would have left grooves. Her head does not move, her eyes continue to bore into the map, not even blinking. Eyes tight, jaw clenched, neck dipped down towards her collar and shoulders huddling over her body. Clint recognizes this as defensive body language. He briefly considers removing the cuffs that chain her to the chair, but he feels like she would attack him. She will not say it, but she thinks she is about to die.
"My name's Clint Barton, by the way," he adds, sitting down on the floor next to her. Her eyes shift in his direction for a moment before moving to the other side, then again to the map.
"Do you not care about that, either?" He laughs, but she does not think this is funny. She looks at him and says in an adamant tone, "I care about where I am."
Clint pauses and looks at her with a surprised expression, like, Oh, of course she'd like to know where she is now. "We're about 50 miles out of New York."
"The city or the state?"
"The city." Her guess was close.
She does not answer, only stretches her neck from side to side and keeps her eyes constant on the map. Clint drums his fingers on the floor and starts to hum a song that she does not recognize. When the song is over, or maybe when he decides it is, he sighs and stands up.
"Can I get you anything?" he asks.
"A Glock G22," she responds with her eyes on the map. He chuckles, and she turns to glare at him. He stops immediately; apparently, she was not joking.
Clint coughs like he's clearing his throat. "Natalia—"
"Natasha," she interjects. After a beat, "Natalia is dead now," she looks at him, through him, and adds, "you killed her."
He swallows, "You want to be Natasha now?"
"I'd rather be Natasha than dead."
"We're not going to kill you, Natasha. SHIELD is going to work with you through deprogramming and training, and then, I don't know, you'll be an asset or an agent or something."
She laughs, it sounds bitter. "Do you make yourself out to be my knight in shining armor?" Her words make little jabs at him; he realizes that she has removed from herself any sense of naivete.
"Not at all. They're going to keep you alive because you're useful."
"I don't have information, you know," she mumbles out of the side of her mouth. "Any intelligence I have is about dead people. Even when you torture me, I won't have anything to say."
"Jesus. We're not going to torture you, either."
"How can you be sure of that?"
"Because I'd never let them."
She looks at him and scoffs, "Never is a promise, Mr. Barton. We're in the business of lying."
He's silent, for a minute. "Give me your pinky," he orders.
She narrows her eyes at him. "Why, exactly?"
"I'm going to pinky promise this to you. I will never let them hurt you."
"I'm handcuffed to this chair."
"Right, right," Clint sighs, and fishes around in his pocket for a key. He kneels in front of her and pushes the key into the cuff around her right hand. It snaps open, and she flexes her wrist.
"I could kill you right now," she observes, voice clinical like perhaps it always is.
"Then I wouldn't be able to keep my promise" he smirks. "Now stick out your pinky."
"This isn't a bizarre fetish of yours, is it?"
"I prefer women who actually like me."
"Dream big."
"You're in no position to be mocking me," he notes as he wraps his pinky finger around hers. She just gives him a half-smile.
"Now," he continues, "I pinky promise that SHIELD will not hurt you." He looks up at her and lets go. "Feeling better?"
"A little bit," she concedes, "But only because now I know that you're stupid and sentimental." She's serious, or at least she looks it.
She isn't surprised when he places the handcuff back around her wrist.
"Sorry," he tells her, and she's almost shocked that he sounds sincere. "I can't say that I fully trust you yet."
She understands, because how could she not? She furrows her eyebrows at Kansas City, Missouri. These people do not make sense to her.
"The director will be here in the morning to meet with you. Um, try to get some sleep before then, I guess."
Natasha does not know if Clint Barton is naive, stupid, or a liar.
The next morning a man she recognizes from photographs as Director Fury walks in, along with a few other people; she learns from studying Fury's expression that Clint Barton is probably all three. Agents release her cuffs but keep their hands on their guns. Natasha comes to the conclusion that America is a strange place.
They ask her questions: she responds only to the ones she wants to, and even then, she lies through most of it. It isn't that she has loyalty to anyone, but that she has too much pride to spill her guts for a few extra hours or days of life.
Coulson turns to Clint during the interrogation and whispers, "Please tell me you know that nothing she's saying is credible."
"Of course, sir," he responds. "You should see her fight, though. It's inhuman. I'm telling you, she could be one of the best field agents we got."
Coulson glares. "You can't be serious."
Clint smiles, "If anyone can do this, it's you. Besides, you gotta admit you like her."
"I think she's clever. And," he adds with a sigh, "I suppose you could use a brain." Coulson ponders the situation for a minute, eyes shifting from Fury, to Natasha, to Clint, back to Natasha. "But," he cautions, "If she kills you, I'm not planning the funeral."
Clint considers this a victory.
Reprogramming is a draining, excruciating, nightmarish experience Natasha would rather not relive. Clint doesn't talk about it.
On the way back from their first mission together, he calls her Nat. Or, specifically, "Good work, Nat."
She arches and eyebrows at him and says, "Nat?"
"It's a nickname, Natasha. Like how Clint is short for Clinton."
"I know, but — it's just… I don't know what to make of it."
"If you don't like it, you can tell me to stop."
"No, it's not that, " she shakes her head. "It means you like me."
He shrugs. "Of course I like you. We're partners now."
"That's weird."
"That I like you or that we're partners?"
She considers this for a moment, smacking her lips. "Probably both," she admits. She fidgets with her hands in her lap.
She twists the widow's bite on her right wrist, she runs her fingers over its grooves. She never looks up.
"So," Clint says to break the silence, "Do you want me to call you Natasha?"
"Nat is fine."
"Are you sure? Because, I mean, if we're going to be working together, I don't want you to feel uncomfortable."
"I won't," she assures him. "A name is a name."
"It's a lot more than that," he notes, but she refuses to believe him.
Natasha stands up and begins to pace back and forth. Clint counts 22 sets before she turns her head towards him, nonchalantly, and asks, "How long until we're back at base?" 23.
"About three hours," he tells her. She sighs.
But she sits back down next to him.
"Tell me, Clint," she says to her knees, "How much do you know about me?"
He scrolls through his brain. "What's in your file, plus maybe 3 or 4 things."
She nods, "And what is that?"
"Well," he breathes out in a laugh and scratches the back of his head. "From your file, I know you're a Russian assassin with expertise in martial arts and ammunitions. You go by the Black Widow, like the spiders who eat their mates. A little gruesome, if you ask me."
"Did it tell you that I killed two SHIELD agents?" she blurts out, and burrows her head into her collar.
He pauses, freezes in place. Is there any right way to answer her? She turns to him with bright blue eye, expectant. He starts with, "Yeah," and swallows, "But I knew that on my own, too."
"Oh, she mumbles, casts her eyes down at her arms, folded across her chest. "I'm sorry." She leans against his shoulder just slightly.
"It's not your fault," he sighs, bringing his head up towards the sky.
She pulls away, "it is, though."
And they are two people who could not console each other.
Three years later, on a mission, she returns to Moscow. When she gets off the plane, and her boots crush the Russian winter beneath her, she inhales sharply like she is choking. Clint notices, and brushes his hand against hers softly for reassurance. He's surprised when she takes it and squeezes, and presses her body against his arm. He wonders if she only feels okay doing this because they are posing as husband and wife.
Her breath condenses in front of her in heavy wisps. She casts her eyes down and keeps walking. Was it the snow or the heat of Clint's hand that made her heart beat like a helicopter? She blinks away the dew on her lashes.
They march wordlessly through the snow, hand in hand, until they reach the hotel. While he walks towards the reception desk he lets go of his hand to sit down. Her hands clamp over her knees and she breathes tersely against her ribs.
After a minute in the lobby, Clint comes back and places his hand on her shoulder. "Are you ready, Nat?"
She leans her head down on his hand, cheek over his calloused knuckles; she nods slightly. Standing up, she mumbles, "Let's go," and slinks back around the chair to grasp his hand again.
They pose as tourists while on the lookout for Chechnyan arms dealers; somehow, the two are not conducive. They find themselves at an abnormal amount of casinos and dive bars.
On the third week, they are ordered to take out the head. They complete their mission — when don't they? — but a bullet grazes Clint's shoulder. Because Clint insisted on waiting before going in, even though she suggested they go in fifteen minutes before.
So she's upset.
Back in the hotel, he presses a towel against his shoulder while she glares at him.
"So," he grimaces, "Are you going to let me bleed out here or are you going to help me?"
"I'm still deciding," she deadpans. She leans against the door at looks right at him. "You should have listened to me." Her collarbones stick out like an exoskeleton.
"In retrospect? Yeah, probably." He snickers.
"This isn't funny," and the coldness in her eyes says the same.
He returns her gaze and feels shameful, like a schoolboy. Grumbling, she gets out the first aid kit.
She presses antiseptic into his skin, knowing it stings. Clint hisses.
"You need to trust me," she tells him while she threads the needle.
"I trust you with my life," Clint replies. He's not sure why she would question this — of course he trusts her.
She shakes her head, red curls ruffling along her collar. "That's not the same."
Clint feels pain in his shoulder and flinches; Natasha does not move a muscle.
"I'm not some ingenue, Clint," she continues. "I know what I'm doing."
"Of — of course, Nat."
"Then trust me." She looks fiercely into his eyes until he nods.
She finishes his stitches without another word and wraps him up.
"Go to sleep," she commands. And honestly? He's too scared to defy her.
A year and spare change after Moscow, Clint needs to go to the grocery store. That isn't to say that he never went in those six months, but this is the one that matters. He buys milk, eggs, coffee, and band-aids, and reflects on the life he is leading. The cashier, a teenager with a buzz cut and a septum ring, gives him a quizzical look.
I know, man. I know. Clint thinks.
The key jangles in the door to his apartment, and he opens the door to find Natasha reading a magazine on his staircase.
She glances up at him and returns promptly to her reading, noting, "Riots in Syria."
"How the fuck did you get in here?"
"Please." She rolls her eyes. And returns to her magazine.
He grunts and puts away his groceries. Speaking through the refrigerator, he asks, "So what brings you to this neck of the woods?"
"Clint, you live in the middle of Manhattan."
"It's an expression, Nat. Like, 'why are you here?'"
She nods cautiously. "I couldn't sleep," she tells him with a shrug.
"Okay." Clint closes the refrigerator door and leans against the door frame to the kitchen. "I guess you can sleep here if you want. I mean, I don't have a guest room. But, uh, you can take the bed. I'll just sleep on the couch."
"No, it's okay. You don't have to do that. I'll just leave." She stands up, leaving the magazine on the step. Clint didn't think it was his, but he doesn't pay much attention to his mail.
"No," he starts, "No, really. I insist. Wouldn't want a distressed partner or anything. Come on, I'll show you, uh, around."
He opens the door to his bedroom and let her go in first. She passes by the light switch, just sits down on the edge of the bed in the dark.
He flips the switch at the same moment she asks, "Is it normal for people to have televisions in their bedrooms?" She turns her head towards him, keeping her eyes on the TV.
"I haven't really put much thought into it, " he admits. "Probably. I mean, no one's ever told me it was strange."
"Let me be the first." He laughs. Then, "Hey, Clint?"
"Mm?"
"Can we watch a movie?"
He looks at her with a confused expression on his face, because he did not peg her as a movie-goer, but she keeps her gaze on the black screen.
"Sure. What do you want to watch?"
"I'm not sure," she responds, and scratches her cheek.
He decides on The Spy Who Loved Me, which he has a feeling she won't really like, but he wants to watch a Bond movie.
During the opening credits, she tells him, "This is a stupid title."
Two hours later, "This is a stupid movie."
"Yeah, I know."
She brings her feet up and tucks them under her legs.
"Do you think I'm a Bond girl, Clint?"
He almost laughs, but then he sees her, and she seems insecure.
"God no, Tasha. You'd eat them all for breakfast."
"Oh," she says in a low voice, and Clint can't quite make out why she sounds somber. She looks up to his ceiling — it's spackled and white — and notes, "You've never called me Tasha before."
"I haven't?"
"No."
"New nickname, then," he smiles. Her lips curve up slightly back at him, grabbing fistfuls of his comforter. Continuing, "Do you believe in love, Clint?"
"Why do you ask?"
"I don't know. I guess because the movie's called The Spy Who Loved Me."
"So you want to know if I believe in it?"
"Not like, in this movie love. Just… love in general. Do you think it exists?"
"Yes," he nods, "I suppose I do, or at least I'd like to. Do you?"
She thinks about it, biting her lip. "I think," she begins, "Some people believe in it, and that makes it real, maybe."
"But do you believe in love for you?"
"I don't, no. I can't really."
"Well, Tasha," he grins wide like a child, "I love you. You're my best friend, you know."
She laughs quietly. "Two hours ago, I would've been impressed with that. Now I'm fairly certain I'm your only friend."
"You little shit! You went through my things."
"I don't know why you're upset. They weren't even interesting."
"Ugh, goodnight," he grumbles in mock disgust, and stands up. She stands up, too, and they are unsure of what to do about themselves.
They hug, because that seems like the natural thing to do. "Goodnight," they tell each other in kind.
Before she lets go, Natasha places a kiss to the base of his neck; he's not sure why she does that, but he lets her. Her breath is warm on his skin even when she pulls away.
After aliens invade New York, Natasha's landlord tells her she can't return to her apartment until they finish repairs because it's a safety hazard.
Natasha thinks that's bullshit.
But she ends up staying at Clint's house until God knows when. If she's being honest, she probably would have ended up here anyway. Loki has left, but he has taken with him something within her partner. Now Clint is more like her, and she's not sure if she likes that.
She stays with him, cooking for him and speaking gently to him. She realizes this is like the mission where they pretended to be married in the suburbs. Except there she had blonde hair and her name was Miranda Jordan, which Natasha thinks is kind of an ugly name. She and Clint are kind of married, Natasha thinks, if friends could get married.
On the fifth day there, when she stubs her toe against his coffee table and yells, "Shit!," he calls her Princess. And something stirs inside her that tells her brain that she does not want to be Clint's friend.
She sleeps on it, it's still there the next morning when she sees Clint drinking coffee out of the pot. And then at noon when he whistles along to Pink Floyd songs. And even at 3PM, when he sees the wreckage on the news and starts crying. As she holds him, she hopes he does not feel the rapid beat of her heart or the warm flush of her cheeks.
"I'm sorry, Nat," he mumbles into her hair. She shakes her hair violently.
"No," she tells him sternly. "You have nothing to be sorry for."
"I could have —" He doesn't finish the thought, though Natasha knows what he was probably going to say.
She lets him sob into her, hands fumbling with the arms of her sweatshirt. When he is done, they slump against each other, exhausted.
She pulls him away and puts her hands on either side of his face. Wiping tears of his face, she tells him, "Get your life together."
He laughs, a sound she's missed.
And then one night, as he gets ready for bed, she knocks on his door.
"Come in," he calls. She opens the door but does not step inside.
He's perched at the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees, hands covering his face. He peeks at her through his fingers, says, "You look like shit."
She laughs, because yeah, she's wearing sweatpants, but he's been a wreck for almost three weeks now. She steps towards him, silent on his floor, and pulls his hands away to pin them at his sides. He looks up at her standing over him.
"You saved me once," she says, "And I'm a lot more difficult than you are."
He stares back at her, but then drops his eyes and chokes out, "How can you have so much faith in me?"
"Because," and she breathes out, "You're the only person who knows me and doesn't run away. And you're the only person who doesn't lie to me."
"You're a better liar," he points out, and he smiles so that when she kisses him, she hits his teeth first. His jaw tightens in shock, and Natasha scrambles to find ways to explain herself.
"Why are you doing this?" he asks, and she mumbles, "I wanted to," like things could be so simple. "I thought… I thought maybe you wanted to, too."
He looks at her incredulously, "Yes. I mean, of course I want to. But we can't just do things on impulses, Tasha. We're partners. Things aren't just black and white!"
"Why can't they be?" she grumbles, head pressed into his shoulder and hands still holding down his. Her back is hunched almost comically.
"Because I know you, and I know this would mean different things to us."
She feels her eyes quiver, but she will not cry and she will not beg. Into his shoulder she whispers, probably more for herself than for him, "I don't think… No. They'd just be different words."
For a full minute, or two, he does not move a muscle. Breath calm, he says, "Are you sure?"
She admits, "No, but you'd know I was lying if I said I was."
So this time, he lets her kiss him.
She thought this would still her heart, but it only beats faster.
Slowly, she climbs up into his lap, and moves her hands to wrap around his neck. His wrap around her waist. He kisses her jaw and whispers, "Do you want to watch James Bond movies?" to which she says, "Shut up," and enforces it with her tongue.
They exchange blind words and they become neon zebras and Natasha is riddled with how silence can say so many things.
Natasha is not sure if she believes in God, but if He exists, she figures He must not be as great as people make Him out to be. Even with the hand she's been dealt, that thought makes her feel blasphemous.
But Clint, Clint is the one good constant in her life. He is there when she is silent and when she is moody and when the oxygen rips from her throat and she looks wide-eyed like a scared animal. He is there and he is solid and warm and kind, and he is the blue like heaven. He's good, even when he isn't, and he doesn't tell her lies to make her feel better. And he loves her, which Natasha thinks is especially astonishing because she didn't know anyone could love a creature as twisted and cruel as she is.
And now God, apparently, or some other force in the universe, has decided to take him from her. He's bleeding out of his throat in an alleyway a few blocks from the UN Building while Natasha hisses into the comms and curses whatever ranking system decides Clint's life was worth less than a Qatari diplomat. And curses Clint for taking a bullet meant for her.
Because, seeing pools of the longest wavelength surround him like a halo, she realizes his death slaughters her more than any weapon ever will.
She holds his hand and tells him he will be fine, everything will be fine — even as they both know it won't. Suddenly, she is no longer too proud to cry.
"You're such a fucking moron," she sobs. "You're so stupid. I'm not anything and you are and you can't do this, Clint."
He tries to laugh but it sputters in his throat. Natasha starts bawling, not stopping to consider if she looks like a petulant child or even caring if she does.
With whatever strength he has left, he reaches a hand to her cheek. His last words, whispered hoarsely in the dark, are, "I'm sorry this happened to you. I love you. Nat. Tasha."
She doesn't even think she believes in love but she knows her heart is breaking. She can feel it crumble inside her ribs.
When his heart stops beating and his lung fail to work she screams and throws her comm against the brick wall. Drenched in him and her tears and sweat, she breaks down in that alleyway, how long she does not know, until a man — a stranger — grabs her gently and leads her out. He dials 911, and lets tears and blood stain his wool jacket. She utters in wracked sobs an apology, and he tells her that it's going to be all right. But she feels and knows it isn't. Even with this man, a grey-haired stranger with wire-rimmed glasses, next to her, she is alone now.
Natasha realizes there is cruel irony in that she has killed Clint and Coulson is not here to plan his funeral.