Clint wanted to go back. He couldn't explain the sudden desire, it just came over him one day.
Natasha, of course, went with him. For both of them, it had been a long time since their pasts stopped being places to venture to alone.
At the airport in Desmoines, Iowa, they rented a car under aliases and Clint got behind the wheel. Natasha didn't ask where they were going. He knew the place.
After an hour and a half of quiet, and no deviation in scenery, they reached Clint's old home town.
Tall grass, trailers and rusty play grounds. This was the good place. This is where he lived before things got bad, then a little better, then a lot worse.
Clint drove slow through this place. His grey eyes took it all in silently. Natasha took it all in too, adding the final details to the full picture of Clint that she knew by heart.
Past the trailer parks, a liquor store, the bowling alley, and the bars, Clint drove as if with purpose. They were out of town and almost back amongst the never ending corn fields when he pulled off onto a dirt road that followed a line of old trees along an irrigation ditch. As they came down a small hill, a building revealed itself.
There was an old stone church standing all alone, clearly still in use, but it had seen better days. The property needed work, and birds nested in the nooks and crannies of the outside walls.
Clint parked the car out in front.
Without a word, he got out and walked toward the little church's door. Natasha followed him. His silence was not full of sadness or pain, but it was full. She could sense that. He hadn't been to this place since losing his parents so long ago.
Nat waited on the steps for a little while after he entered the church. He was meeting with his past and it had been a while.
When she finally did push open the door and step in, she was greeted by an old smelling coolness, and a comfort covered in dusty silence. Nat looked toward the front of the church and saw Clint sitting there, his face turned up toward small stained glass windows set high in the walls. His eyes were closed and the narrow shafts of colored sunlight bathed his face.
Slowly she approached where he sat and came to rest beside him. Despite the loneliness she felt this place conveyed, Clint looked content. Not happy, but safe, like he belonged.
After a long moment he broke the silence. "Our parents brought us here on Sundays, ...before they died."
She did not offer a response. She well understood a far away past, what came before all the darkness. Hers, however, was all but lost from memory.
Eyes still closed, Clint's mouth quirked into the smallest of smiles.
"I remember everything." He said quietly. "I can hear them singing."
Natasha was grateful that one of them could still remember.
.
.
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This was inspired by/based on the song, "Methodism In Middle America" by a band called Trampled By Turtles. To me, the song itself totally became a little fic.
I've been trying to write this for a while and here it is finally!
I'd love to know what you think!