Disclaimer: All rights reserved to Stan Lee, Marvel, Disney and basically everybody but me, as always. Also thanks to Halsey and her awesome album, that has given me the inspiration for this cute pairing aka Lila and Costel. Note at the end.
CHAPTER ONE
2023
He decides to call her at two am, when nightmares wouldn't stop showing around and he has finally understood he's not even that close to Stark Tower. Probably he's not even that close to his apartment in the Queens, but he's too drunk to even recognize if he's calling the right person.
After a bunch of minutes, just when he's thinking about hanging up, a soft voice still muffled by sleep answers him, and he clearly understands there's something wrong in who has just talked to him.
"Costel? – are you okay?" the voice asks him again, but all he can do is brush his hand in his hair, a quiet hum escapes his lips.
"Yeah I… sorry, I didn't mean to wake you." He mutters, stumbling into his own words just like the first time he has seen the owner of that voice. "I'm really sorry Barton, I thought I was calling Zrinka."
He hears a soft laugh, followed by someone else's muffled words, maybe complaining. "Was I interrupting something…?" he asks mildly, mentally cursing for putting himself into such uncomfortable situations.
"No – not really. Cassandra passed by and she's staying for the night. She's listening, too by the way." And before he could even say something, Cassandra Lang's high pitched voice almost breaks his tympanum.
"Hey loser!"
"Hey dumb." He says mindlessly, eyes wide open when nobody talks again on the other side. And then Lila Barton's soft voice breaks again.
"She's kidding." She explains quickly.
"I wasn't." He replies in what seems an attempt of flirt, but with that weird drunk voice it only sounds stupid.
Lila doesn't say anything about it, but doesn't stop talking. "Didn't you have to call Zrinka anyway?" she finally asks, as always trying not to sound rude.
His mind slowly recalls what he has firstly said to her and rolls his eyes. In his minds crosses the thought to ask her why is she still awake, just to keep it going, but he's not dumb, and neither Lila and Cassandra, so he just spills out what's going on.
"I needed her to pick me up – I think I am lost." He states, and he can somehow fell Lila's disappointment, because again, she's not dumb, plus she knows better.
"I'm on my way." She says after a while. Costel brows furrow in confusion.
"What?"
"I'm coming to pick you and take you home – are you drunk?" she asks and he feels her voice high and low, probably because she's moving.
"There's no need to."
"Are you kidding me? We're friends, Cos. Don't even try to move away." And then she hangs up.
Costel doesn't know how is she could pick him up since he's in New York and she's supposed to be in Iowa, at the Household – like always. He stays where he is anyway, not moving just as she has demanded – he just sits on the sits on a bench near there when his head starts to spin.
When Lila calls him again because in the rush she has forgotten to ask him about what he has around him, he tells her he can only see fancy buildings, and twenty minutes after, Lila parks her tiny car in front of him and gets out quickly – and in the same rush she shoves him into the car, explaining him he's in Upper East Side that's why is so fancy... never heard of Gossip Girl? and she just checks on him, hoping he won't pass out in her arms.
Despite the time and the fact she has probably been into polish nails and sleepovers things with Cassandra, Lila doesn't look tired, nor pissed for being there instead that with her best friend.
She's silent, though and Costel knows pretty well it's all appearance, and that she'll turn in an hurricane of words when she'll know what to say exactly.
In another circumstance he would turn the radio on, and she would sing out loud, windows open and wind flipping their hair gently. In this circumstance, she's silent and his mind is screaming of murders and death and destruction – all things that seems to be happened a lifetime ago.
Head rested on the seat, Costel thinks about how would it be to just release all the hate, the sadness. Perhaps share it with somebody else, somebody who's not his sister. Somebody outside that maybe would judge him, but maybe won't if this person is Lila.
And he feels like he could tell her, bear the weight with her, who seems so strong minded opposite to his, which is just a tangled mess of faults.
"I thought you would have come to say hi." She breaks suddenly, voice monotone. "You know, at the Tower – I'm also leaving tomorrow."
And here's the hurricane of words, Costel can already feel it coming. "I was with some friends." He explains before she could tell anything else. "When did you even arrive anyway?" he asks in her same tone of voice. She sighs a little, and her gaze leaves for a little the street.
"I sent you an email. And also a text – to which you didn't reply."
Costel's eyes fix on the ground, and again a sense of guilt almost eats him alive. "It was this guy's birthday…" he lies, but he doesn't end it, since he already knows she knows it's not true. She always does (and he doesn't know how).
Anyway, she doesn't push him to tell her what's going on, and Costel mentally thanks her to be so patient to him. They finally arrive to an old building, and Costel can somehow tell that's not the Queens. "Where are we going?" he asks, but Lila is already out of the car. "My dad's place." She simply answers. "He doesn't live here by the way." She explains when he attempts to get again into the car.
He likes Clint – he really does. Plus he saved his life, so he's basically one of his favorite heroes. Costel somehow likes all the Bartons, apart Lila's uncle, Charles… Barney. He doesn't know – but he knows he's nuts and also an awful big brother.
They slowly go upstairs, using the emergency stairs, and Lila explains to him that the place was falling to pieces and the people who live there just decided to use the emergency stairs as normal stairs during the renovations.
"Why did you take me here? You could have taken me at my place, you know."
Lila sighs, and Costel is quite sure she's rolling her eyes while opening the door. "I want to show you something – you're the first one to see it, so be happy about it." She says quickly and turns the lights on.
The apartment is tiny but the furniture in it make it look bigger. In the center there is a couch and a few pillows are steady rested on it. On the left there is a modern kitchen and not far from it there's the cook isle. Pendant lights are set all around the place and it looks like some big tent. There are dishes on the sink and the walls are white but there are some purple paint brushes lying around.
"It's nice." He tells her shrugging.
"I know." She replies like it was something obvious. "Dad said I could use it, but he has put cameras and alarms since it's not really so nice outside here."
Costel nods while taking a look out of the window, and everything is just so dark and they're probably the only light lit up at this late hour.
"But you said you were coming home." He mutters after a while, remembering she was a bit upset about him not going to say hi at the Tower. "Why did you renovate this place if you're going to Waverly again?"
Lila laughs softly, and sits on the couch. "I'm going there to pick the last few things – then I'll be a full newyorker baby. Just like the old times." She says, referring to when she was born, probably. At least he knows she was born there.
"Isn't it Brooklyn?" he asks narrowing his eyes, and in the meantime he is sitting on the couch, just like he would have lived there all his life.
"Yep, but you know, that's my last year at college, and after that there's the master." She explains, pride filling the room.
Costel listens to her, smiles and nods at the right parts, but in his heart he knows she going too fast. Lila Barton has always been the prodigy kid, graduated at high school at fourteen and now she's sixteen and soon to be graduated at college. Tony Stark is already starting all the practice to take her in his team at Stark Labs and it all looks like a big mess.
Of course he would never tell her to stop being this awesome prodigy she is and slow down a bit to enjoy her teenage years, but she looks happy and that's perfectly fine to him.
"How are you, Cos?" she finally asks out of blue, and Costel takes a lot of time to actually understand what she truly means.
"I'm okay, thanks." He states. "You look better than me, though." He adds smirking a little.
Lila purses her lips into a small smile and nods. Just like before, Costel is happy she's not pushing to know everything.
"Are those friends of yours cool?" she asks and her voice is shaking a little, gaze fixed on the television in front of them. It's clearly turned off, so Costel doesn't really understands what she's looking at, until he notices the wall is full of pictures.
Some of them portray the Bartons, some Wanda and a just out of hospital Pietro, some Cooper and Clint with their bows and again some with Nathaniel but most of them portray Lila, Cassandra, Cooper, Ace Peterson and him, the kid who was any hero's child but had a lot of heroes' children as best friends.
"They're okay. They're from the art school." that one you should have attended, too he would add, but he eventually shuts. And he's not even that friends with those guys, but he doesn't tell her that, too.
Lila nods slowly, but then doesn't ask anything and just decides she's hungry. Twenty minutes later he's helping her cooking something before she'd burn the kitchen down.
"I've ordered pizza during those days." She explains. "Aunt Nat has made sure I would have always eaten something, anyway. I think mom has pissed her a lot." She adds angling her head in order to read the recipe on her iPad.
Costel helps her putting things in the bowl and occasionally complaining about her reading wrong the recipe ("I'm pretty sure that's too much salt do you want us to die Barton?"). In the meantime, in his head and heart, that sense of guilt is decreasing, the voices are shutting and everything seems almost as normal as it was a lifetime ago.
NOTES
Hello kids. This is the most insane things ever, but you know, I kind of like insane things, lol. Totally different background: our children are almost adults and Lila Barton is some kind of hero, just in a different way. Costel, as you may notice, is the symbol of a childhood spent among the war. That kid almost died and has seen a man die and not just some man, but the one who managed to make his big sister smile. I think it's a big trauma. There will also be Cooper and Cassandra (I already say that I'll stick on mcu Cassie look, so she'll be a brunette lol) and I said in this first chapter, there will also be Ace! I think this is all for now, stay tuned and check my page for news.
Also, reviews are like gold 3