In his tiny chair Clint stared down at the grey carpet that covered the length of the office. It's that kind of carpet that's never just one color- it has dark threads of purple and green and blue woven into the grey. For a moment he wiggled in the chair and made an awkward scene of finding the best position in which to look at the fabric of his chair cushion. Spreading his legs ended up being a better choice than twisting to see it under his butt. It's yellow, but again not just yellow. White and light-blue-maybe-silver also cross into it. Clint grimaced and continued to look at the carpet, rubbing his thumb over his pants in a kind of lost irritation. There's this droning noise just outside of his ears and he thinks he knows what he's hearing but he can't quite make himself care enugh to really define it. He starts scratching his pants with his nails. When the noise starts sounding like something he can identify, he focuses on the carpet threads a little less.
"-ent Barton?"
Clint raised his head slowly, face slack and dazed. "Huh?"
The man behind the chrome polished desk raised his brows at the agent. He has a long face the color of dry beach sand and keeps his desk neatly organized but full of... stuff. He has a Newton's Cradle but Clint's thankful it isn't moving. He'd most likely swipe it right off the desk the second he came into the room. For a second he wondered how he knew what it was called.
"Feeling alright today? You seem to find the carpeting fascinating," the man said. The name plaque on the edge of the desk read 'Dr. Winchester'. Clint wondered if the doctor forgot his name often enough to warrant the name plaque.
"It has too many colors," Clint decided.
Doctor Winchester nodded his head slowly and reached for a pen, jotting something down in the folder he had flipped open. Clint scoffed. Apparently his assessment of the carpet was noteworthy. Good. Maybe they'll rip it out and put something sensible in. He thought he should make his opinion heard more often if anyone would take him seriously. But Clint knew his remark was being noted against him.
'Unfocused.'
'Distant.'
He might as well say it all. "The chair too."
The doctor looked up from his scribbling with interest. "Oh?"
"Yellow with white and light blue? I think it's blue." Clint leaned down between his thighs to look closely at the cushion. "Could be silver."
Winchester put down his pen and gave Clint his full attention. "Is it jarring to have too many elements? Do you prefer the simplicity of complimentary colors?"
"You mean do I like things to be black and white?"
"Sure," the doctor said.
"Nothing is black and white, Doc. You're a shrink, you should know that." Clint had a feeling this conversation was going nowhere he wanted it to go.
Winchester pushed his lips out and nodded. "Yes, but some things can be. Especially inside one's mind. For some, one set of parameters can be cut and dry, and then for others a hundred shades of grey. Are you finding that you wish life was one or the other?"
The men stared at each other.
"Because of Loki."
Clint hoped he didn't flinch at the name. He hoped he kept a straight face and tried to brush the conversation off.
"I thought we already had this talk," he said.
"About color?"
Clint wanted to punch Winchester in the mouth for playing dumb. For trying to make him say the name.
"Look, Doc," he said, sighing and resting his arms heavily in his lap. "We talked about it, and him, and I'm done with it. I'm ready to move on here."
"Ready to move on yet you can't say his name. It's just a name, it has no power over you."
"Not anymore, right?" Clint accused. "What is this, a fucking speech from Hermione? I'll call that asshole Voldemort if I want, but I'd rather not call him at all!"
Clint snapped his mouth shut and jabbed his elbows onto his knees, resting his head against his fists while he calmed himself. Winchester let him.
"I'm ready. I am," he said to his lap. "Just... Being forced into these sessions is pissing me off."
The doctor seemed agreeable to that point. "We could take a break. Take a few weeks away, at home, and then see each other later."
Clint exhaled hard and rubbed his reddened face. "Yeah... uh, please, yeah I'd like that."
The doctor quietly went about shuffling through papers in a drawer and filling one out, letting Clint sit silently in his chair. He went to rest his arms and jerked them back at the cold. The frame was chrome just like the desk. They were probably a matching set but the doctor switched it out for his own plush leather chair. Clint felt that Winchester most likely made more money than he did. What a gip- saving the world verses digging into someone's head. The thought made him feel even worse. He was sure there was some sick joke in there, but he preferred not to think about it.
"Alright," Winchester said to break Clint out of his daze. "I'll send these along and we'll meet again in three weeks. It that long enough?"
It'll never be long enough.
"I'll take it," Clint said and walked out of the office.
The thought of the break from his psychiatrist sapped most of the stress from Clint's muscles and he walked easily through headquarters to his locker. He was moving automatically, not thinking about why he would be taking his battle gear with him. He wandered down to the basement that was officially labeled 'GYM', but it was a basement. All concrete and steel; no windows. He skirted the rows of workout machines and edges of the wresting mats and when he made it into the locker room he suddenly didn't know why he was there. He stared at his locker and breathed in the damp warm air of the showers.
Locker number 111.
He had drawn arrowheads and fletchings on the numbers when he was recruited. In full view of the Director, of course, who looked none-too pleased but never made any attempt to remove it. Clint had been proud of his work of art then, backing away from the locker with his chest puffed out like a song-bird. Long time ago it felt like. Back when he knew that he was killing for the sake of humanity. Now? Even the good guys were a little backhanded.
Clint tried not to think about it and smiled at his arrow drawings and started to twist the locking dial. Across the showers and lockers he heard a woman's voice.
"Female on the floor!"
And the men who heard her echoed her warning,
"Female on the floor."
"Female on the floor."
"Female on the floor!"
The agent in Clint's row of lockers grabbed his shorts and quickly tugged them on.
"Clint!" That woman's voice again.
Clint turned and smiled when the bouncy red hair came around the corner of lockers. She wore tiny shorts and a crop top with sneakers and she dried her sweaty forehead with the towel draped over her shoulders.
"Hey, Nat," Clint greeted her and opened his locker.
"Wanna get down and dirty with me?"
Clint snorted and shook his head while he fingered the arrows in his mechanized quiver. "Nah," he declined. "I'm going home."
"Oh, yeah?" Natasha sat on the long row of benches behind them and pulled on the ends of her towel. "I noticed you're out early." She had memorized his schedule of shrink meetings. Out early meant Clint had either walked out, or talked well enough for the doctor to be pleased with his 'progress'.
"Yeah," he sighed and sat down beside her, thigh to thigh. "Winchester's giving me a break finally. Got a few weeks to myself."
"So what are you doing down here?"
Clint loved her soft and quiet tone. He never felt like she was accusing or talking down to him.
"I have no idea," he said and chuckled. "Guess it's just habit to get my gear." He flipped the locker door shut with his boot and tossed the heavy lock gently in his hand. He clicked his tongue and stood. "Guess I'm going home then." He slid the lock in place and clicked it shut.
Natasha had stood up and walked with him out of the showers. When someone across the gym called out for her to join them she squeezed Clint's arm in goodbye.
"Say hello to Chuck for me," she called as she and Clint parted ways.
"His name is Charles!" Clint yelled.
He watched her move to spot someone on the heavy weights and smiled when she encouraged the guy like any other 'dude' would. He couldn't hear her, but he knew what she would be saying.
'Come on, come on. Yeah! Get some!'
And when the bar was fitted back into it's resting place:
'Whoo, good show! Ready for another lift? Yep, work that shit!'
Clint laughed as he climbed the stairs out of the basement. Weird chick.
Clint wanted to smack himself for taking the unnecessary trip down to the basement as he started hopping the steps up and up through headquarters two at a time. He climbed up to the top and gathered his breath at the closed door down at the end of the hall. He knocked politely and then entered, finding the Director of SHIELD leaning back on a sofa, one leg languidly crossed over the other at the knee. The man looked up from the papers in his hand and seemed surprised.
"Agent Barton," the man acknowledged at sat up.
Clint nodded in return. "Director Fury."
"Is there a problem?"
"No, sir," Clint reassured and stepped further into the spacious office.
Fury gave Clint a waiting stare with his one eye and the blond figured he should get to the point.
He cleared his throat. "Well, I'm, uh... I'm taking a few weeks off." He stammered and folded his arms in front of him.
"Are you asking me or telling me?" Fury asked sternly as he leaned back on the couch and spread his arms along the back of it.
Clint weighed his options for a second and then thought 'what the hell'. Fury was giving him the choice, right? "I'm telling you. The Doc and I are taking a break and I'm gonna take this time for myself."
If that didn't make it sound like they were dating. Winchester and Clint had spent enough time together.
"Are you going off the grid? Should I be concerned?"
"If I do, sir, Agent Romanoff will know where I am."
Fury nodded once and hummed.
"Three weeks, sir," Clint assured. "Three weeks and I'm back.
The director acquiesced with a nod of his bald head and waved a hand. "If Winchester's letting you off the hook, I've got nothing to say then."
Clint quirked the corner of his mouth in a half smile and bowed his head. "Thank you, sir." He shoved his hands into his coat pockets and retreated from Fury's office, heading back to the ground floor and into the garages to find his bike.
Through the New York traffic Clint weaved his motorcycle between vehicles, chuckling to himself when he sometimes drove onto the sidewalks a moment and scared the pedestrians. He tried not to do it often though, he felt like the cops would be onto him sooner or later.
Finally out of the busy streets and onto residential roads, Clint parked his bike against the curb and hopped up the few steps to his apartment building. Upon opening his front door he breathed deeply, smelling light dust and he wrinkled his nose at it, but it was home. He shrugged off his jacket and threw it over the back of the couch, toeing off his boots at the same time and wriggling his sock covered toes. He moved into the tiny kitchen then and opened the window above the sink, the only window in his apartment, and he looked across the alleyway to the next building. Another window, small and singular like his own, sat directly across the way, its short curtains rustling in the breeze. A woman with fading coppery hair washed the dishes in that window and Clint thought she looked as tired and out of it as he felt. The woman glanced up as though she could feel his gaze and she smiled gently at him. He smiled back and waved before moving away to the end of the counter where a tall vase sat with a lone fish swimming inside it. Clint rested his head and arms on the counter beside the vase and watched the white and orange beta fish nibble at the roots of the plant floating on top of his water.
"Hey, Charles," Clint said to the fish. "'Tasha says hello."
Charles ignored him and swam a circuit around his bowl.
Clint straightened and tapped his hand on the counter. "Good talk."
He started to head back into the living room when music began drifting in through the open window. Jazz. Clint stopped and smiled to himself, knowing it was the woman in the apartment building across the alley who put it on. She puts it on for him, he knows. He leaned against the back of the couch, facing the front door, having forgotten what he was going to do. He closed his eyes and listened to the soft notes wafting into his home. Sometimes he wished he knew the names of the songs, but he felt it might take some of that magic out of it. He could very well buy the songs, listen to them whenever he pleased... And then this rapport would suddenly not feel so special. He didn't want that.
After a moment he finally moved, slowly roaming the couple rooms of his apartment aimlessly. He ended up in the living room again, sparse as it was with a simple couch, large television seated on the floor, end table. The highlights of his decor are things he picked up from missions. A prayer rug he stole from a temple in Bursa lay on the floor between the couch and TV. He smuggled it back in his pack as a sleeping mat. On the second-hand end table sat a large brass ashtray embossed with the images of the animals of the Chinese zodiac which he used as a candy tray. Clint had run along the rooftops of a city square in Jinhua during the lunar new year celebrations, keeping out of sight from the locals and starting to head home after a mission well done when he stopped to watch dancers shimmy down the streets. He'd stopped just above someone's balcony where the ashtray sat, full of cigarette butts, and he nabbed it, just like that. In Japan, with Natasha, he'd bought her a kimono, full and rich and she looked beautiful in it; while he got for himself a few of the furin wind chimes to hang in front of his kitchen window. His bed was covered in bedsheets from India.
He sat on the arm of the couch, looking up at the wooden bow hanging on the wall and the quiver stuffed full of arrows in the corner. He tapped his fingers on his arms restlessly and then pushed himself to fall back onto the cushions. He stared at the ceiling and pulled out his phone, dialing Natasha.
It rang in his ear for a moment before he remembered that she'd most likely still be in the gym. She tended to make a day of it. Sure enough, the call went to voicemail.
'You know who you called- you know what to do,' her recorded voice said and then the line beeped, ready for his message.
"Nat, I'm going camping tomorrow," he declared. "I'll meet you on the roof of HQ at 0700; you can jet me over. See ya." He hung up and rolled off the couch, finding himself not quite so tired as he went about packing up for the trip.
With a heavy pack strapped over his shoulders and the bow from his wall and quiver in hand, Clint walked out onto the rooftop where Natasha was already waiting. She leaned against the back of the quinjet, her bright red locks waving over her face in the wind. She held some of it back with one hand to the side of her head and nodded with a smile at the other agent. Clint smiled back at her. She was beautiful. He loved their easy relationship; that they could just request stuff, demand things without asking and they made sure to do it for each other. They could ask if the other was okay without really asking. He could sit with her and touch; love her without having to be in love with her.
Natasha snorted at Clint's goofy grin and turned to open the hatch of the jet, heading into the cockpit. Clint followed and stowed his gear, hitting the button for the metal lip of the machine to close them in and then he joined her in the co-pilot's seat. She ran the startup tests while he buckled in and double-checked her work.
"Did you bring your elf repellent?" She asked as slipped the headset over her ears and moved the microphone into position by her mouth.
In a good mood, Clint didn't roll his eyes at the recurring joke of his weapon choice. Everyone at SHIELD decided that if elves existed they'd fawn over the archer. He shook his head and played along for this one.
"Nah, I think I'm just gonna get boned by Thranduil this time," he replied flippantly.
Natasha cackled at this, expecting him to flip her off for her comment rather than volley back.
"What," Clint sounded offended. "You don't think I deserve a king?"
She shrugged and pulled her laughter down to chuckles and concentrated on guiding the jet through the air. "What about Elrond?"
Clint laughed himself this time and broke out of the banter. "Are we seriously talking about this right now?"
"You're the one that ran with it," Natasha defended. "You could've stopped at the beginning."
Clint rolled his eyes and they settled into a quiet companionship, watching the skies roll past them. "Thranduil has prettier lips," he muttered.
Natasha smiled at him and said nothing.