A/N: My first time writing some Blackhawk from Clint's perspective for once. It's a recap of them, the moments most imortant to Hawkeye captured in six scenes throughout their partnership.
Warnings: light swearing, mentions of violence
Disclaimer: Marvel owns Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton, I'm writing this just for the fun of it.
Clint is twenty-one when he meets her for the first time.
He has watched her for the better part of three days, has followed her around Yekaterinburg during the day when she pretends to be a jobless girl from a village in the middle of Russian nowhere that came to the city to make something of her life. And he has followed her at night, when she changes plain clothes for an outfit that emphasizes the curves of her body much better, meeting the most dangerous men in the seediest bars with a daring grin on her lips.
Observe. Confirm that's she's a bitch without consciousness like the reports say. Kill her. Those are his orders.
The limit is a week and he doesn't hurry. Clint is a sniper, watching patiently is half of his job description.
Then, suddenly… he's awake after not even two hours of sleep because the string around his pinky is pulled tight, telling him that her door has been opened.
Cursing he grabs his bow, heads to the window, sees nothing and is on the roof with a view into her living room a few seconds later. There are three heavily armed men scouring the small apartment, but she isn't there – if she was they'd be dead already.
She has played him. She has known that he's tailing her for only god knows how long and now she's gone, probably already killing the man he knows she's been hired to kill. Another curse is on his lips when he leaps onto the next balcony, going straight for the drug lords house because if he hasn't fucked up completely he probably still has a chance of getting her before she's out of the country.
Hell has broken lose in the building when he arrives, guards running wild in search of the Black Widow – someone has blown her, and she won't be happy, and this means another guy will end with a bullet through his head by tomorrow morning.
He's running along the corridor at full speed, about to turn the corner- and stops dead in his tracks, her dagger pointed to his neck before he can do anything else but stare that her.
"A kid!" she snorts in Russian, somewhere between insulted and surprised. But he's not listening, he's looking at her, really seeing her because if she's the last thing he'll see then he can as well enjoy it. It's the first time he gets a look at her real self, red curls framing her face, the black catsuit skin-tight and green eyes returning his gaze without blinking. She's gorgeous.
"You are a fucking kid." it's English this time and Clint knows that he's dead at twenty-one… damn, he at least wanted to make it till thirty.
Burning pain surges through his body, but it's not from his heart or neck like he has imagined but from where the dagger buries in his left upper arm. He is honest-to-god surprised, but doesn't have any time to think about what the fuck just happened – a smoke bomb his making his eyes water and his breathing come in rough coughs.
Pulling out the dagger, bandaging the wound as good as possible on short notice and getting rid of a patrol that suddenly pops out in front of him takes Hawkeye more time than he has, and when he finally stops in front of the drug bosses door he hears the high-pitched scream of a dying man. He's too late.
Only moments later she emerges from the room and he curses under his breath when she actually avoids his blow to her temple. The Black Widow is a master at hand-to-hand combat, so he moves fast to have the advantage, and is actually a little perplexed when his fist graces her side and makes her stagger.
Striking out once more Clint grimaces when she drops down to the floor to avoid his blow – there are many things he expects to happen next, but the one he doesn't is her blacking out cold.
He's telling himself what an idiot he is when he picks her up carefully, noting the blood soaking the left side of her catsuit and wondering when the hell she got that wound, and carries her back to the tiny excuse of a place SHIELD has rented for him.
Really, he should kill her, but he can't. She hasn't killed him either.
The intel is incorrect… because Natasha (then) Romanova has a consciousness, and he tells her so after he has tied her to his bed and pulled a bullet out of her body. "They were wrong."
She calls him a fool or it – and she is most likely right – but then probably so is she, because she doesn't try to kill him either when he undoes her bounds.
When he sets off to meet with Coulson the next morning Natasha follows him.
He is twenty-five when he takes a bullet for Natasha the first time.
There has been no reason for him to step in front of her, she growls at him when she presses her fragile, lethal, hands to the heavily bleeding wound in his shoulder. Of course she is right, but he remembers sitting on her tights, pulling the bullet out of her flesh with a makeshift scalpel and watching her bite open her lower lip in pain while he works.
It was the most intoxicating and at the same time terrifying thing he has never done – her skin hot from the fever, green eyes full of pain, death breathing down both their necks and the only thing he can think of is that she is beautiful.
Clint hasn't expected it to hurt that much, and Natasha laughs at him when he tells her so.
Her fingers works swiftly, her gaze never leaving him to make sure that he doesn't black out halfway through it, and she smirks in satisfaction when the bullet is out and he heaves up in the trash bin she has placed beside him.
"Never do that again." she doesn't need to say it aloud, the look she gives him being enough to make perfectly clear that she doesn't want to repeat the incident – he understands, and nods, and knows that he'll do it again in a heartbeat.
She is his partner after all.
There is no one else that she can put up with for a prolonged period of time, and there is no else he wants to work with. They are the best team SHIELD has, they complement each other. He cannot imagine a life without her in it anymore.
Passing him the bottle of vodka she lifts an eyebrow, but he doesn't voice his thoughts out loud.
Clint Barton knows Natasha Romanoff well enough to know that she can't handle things like that. Emotions. She will just brush him off angrily and tell him that he is weak and a fool and this is what will get him killed someday – and she will be right of course.
So he doesn't say it. He takes the bottle in silence and doesn't react when his fingertips brush against hers.
He'll wait. He'll be patient until the day she is ready to hear it – that's what he's best at, after all.
He is thirty-two when he thinks he'll lose her for the first time.
It is also the first time they sleep together, and will be the only one for the next thirteen years.
"Tasha!" it is nothing but a frantic scream in the cold night air and he watches as she turns her head around, craning her neck to look at him, the bullet that was meant for her spine swiping along her skin and missing her artery by a hair's breadth.
Cursing Budapest and this whole fucked up mission Clint lets go of the bowstring and watches with satisfaction as his arrow hits the man that shot Natasha square in the chest – he won't die immediately, and he really hopes that the bastard will suffer for hours before he kicks the bucket.
They are outnumbered but not outclassed, and the adrenaline coursing through his veins at seeing his partner nearly die only makes him more ruthless, his shots even more lethal – Natasha is back to back with him, cutting down enemies one after another with swift, elegant movements that makes it look like child's play. The Back Widow is done playing around.
An hour later they are done.
Blood that is not their own soaks the expensive carpet of his suite but Clint doesn't care, his eyes only seeing the woman standing in front of him in the remains of what once was the habit of a nun.
She almost died. Natasha almost died tonight, the angry red line on her neck reminding him whenever he looks at her, terrifying him to the core.
He can't live without her, he realizes when he cradles her face in his hands, his fingers running up and down her cheeks to make sure that she is indeed there, that she is alive. There is no place for him in a world without Natasha Romanoff – it isn't a world he wants to live in.
Her green eyes are holding his gaze when he draws her closer until he is holding her tight against his chest. Clint cannot let her go, can't stop himself from pressing her body even closer to his and never wanting to let her go. He is kissing her then, slowly, deliberately, and her arms come around his neck when he buries his hands in her red curls, running his fingers through the thick strands over and over again.
They sink on the king-sized bed where he takes his time with her. She squirms and hisses in impatience, but he has to make sure that she is real, that he hasn't lost her.
Natasha asks him for how long he has wanted to do this between kisses, smirking, and he answers honestly, "From the moment I stripped you down in Yekaterinburg."
They do not say anything else after that. They don't need to.
I love you. He doesn't say it. If he'll say it, she'll run, they both know it. Instead he shows her, traces every scar on her body, strokes his fingers softly down her skin like he has always wanted to, makes her beg in Russian, makes love to her.
He is forty-five when he tells her that he loves her for the first time.
They have been partners for the better part of twenty-four years now and Clint knows Natasha like no one else does. He knows that she doesn't sleep without a knife under her pillow, knows that she doesn't ever take pain meds even when he's pulling a fucking bullet out of her, knows that she killed her first man at eleven and fucked the first one at thirteen… and he knows that she will never admit what they have unless he'll make the first step.
Behind all that distant demeanor, behind the Black Widow, Natasha is too insecure to open up like that, to show vulnerability, because it has been beat into her that if she does it will end in pain.
"I love you, Natasha." hey says it, just like that, and she stiffens.
A part of her still associates love with weakness, and weaknesses gets people killed in their business – Clint sees the emotions flash over her beautiful green eyes. Fear is the immediate one, but it is pushed aside by uncertainty, hope, happiness and eventually something like …amusement?
Her muscles are tense, ready to flee, but she doesn't. She holds her ground, and that is one of the reasons he loves her so much. Natasha never backs down.
"I know." she says and then chuckles. It sounds content, almost happy.
Of course she does, she would be a lousy master spy if she didn't. He has never tried to hide his feelings from her either – there is just no point in hiding something from a woman whose job it is to discover secrets.
Slowly she walks up to him, all luscious curves and swaying hips, and Clint can't say that he isn't a bit distracted by it. Natasha laughs when she catches his gaze with her own.
"How long, Clint?" her eyes are burning and his breath catches in his throat.
He doesn't really understand why she is asking, what she wants to hear from him, but that look she gives him makes him shiver and hope, because she isn't running yet and that stance is the one Natasha always takes when she is about to take down her prey.
Memories fly by him, moments of them together, dancing on the terrace of the Schloßhotel in Berlin, her sleeping beside him after New York, them standing back to back in Budapest… the feeling has always been there. Clint tries to pinpoint where, when, it started, and in the end it comes back to that one day that has changed their lives.
"Since I pulled that bullet out of you… since I realized that you outsmarted me, since I saw you standing there in fighting gear like a goddess ready to strike… when you called me a boy, when you bit your lip open but refused to scream because you were just too damn proud…" he trails off.
It is the truth and he refuses to be embarrassed by it.
Her eyes are glistening and he has never seen her cry, "You are a fool, Clint Barton. This will get us killed."
He grins, "You said that back then too, twenty-four years ago, and here I am, still alive."
Natasha laughs, one of her rare honest-to-god laughs, and he remembers Yekaterinburg yet again, and that she is just as beautiful laughing now as she was back then – damn, he'll die for that woman one day, and he'll do it happily.
"I… I don't know how to do this, Clint. I'm scared."
Her voice his sober now, and he knows how much it costs her to actually say the words out loud, to confide in him like this. She really trusts him, something the Black Widow has never fully done outside a mission… but the woman standing in front of him is Natasha, not the Widow, and that's all the difference it takes.
Clint understands but doesn't know what to answer, how to voice what he knows is the truth, and so he does the only thing he can think of, the same thing he has done in Budapest. He grabs her face with his hands and kisses her. There is no need to be scared. Putting his arms around her middle he pulls her against him and breaths in her scent when he buries his face against her neck. I'm here. His fingers find their way into her hair, playing with it while he kisses her earlobe. I'll always be there.
Petite hands come up to his shoulders and she stands on her tiptoes to take his lips with hers, those beautiful green eyes full of emotion she can't yet verbalize.
It's okay, he thinks. One day Natasha will be able to say it back. I love you.
He is a patient man, he will wait until she is ready.
He is almost forty-six when Natasha gives birth to their children.
She shouldn't be able to. She is older than him even though she looks much younger, and he knows that theoretically her time frame for having children is already over. Clint knows better than to ask however the morning she tells him that she is pregnant, the both of them sitting on the couch in the Avengers Tower and watching the sun rise over the skyline of New York.
This is the part of her past she has told no one about, the part she keeps hidden even from him and he respects that, respects her. One day she will tell him, and until then he'll wait for her.
Their daughters are the most beautiful babies he was ever seen.
Of course he is biased, but Clint doesn't care – not when he watches Natasha holding them close to her chest, an exhausted but none the less pleased smile on her face. He hasn't seen her that content, that happy, in a very long time and he knows when he watches the three most important woman in his life together for the first time that he will do anything in his power to ensure that nothing will ever destroy that happiness.
Anna is a whirlwind, twenty-one minutes older than her younger sister and always looking out for Sophia despite the fact that the younger of his girls is the one less likely to get in trouble. They are inseparable, clinging to each other even tighter when someone dares trying to pry them apart.
At first he is afraid, afraid that he'll do something wrong and everything will go to hell – he sees it in Natasha's eyes too, the insecurity of fucking up at the whole parenting thing, of doing wrong by the twins. The thought terrifies the both of them.
It gets better over time though, when they grow healthy and happy and even more beautiful.
Clint cannot stop but smile when he watches them, hiding is favorite Captain America plush toy from Tony's son over and over again until Jack is on the verge of crying and they bring it back guiltily to make up with their older friend.
One time Anna has the idea to play doll with Jacks little sister and it ends with three little girls and the living room smeared with pink lipstick – Pepper throws a fit while Tony laughs till he cries beside her, him and Natasha both trying very hard to suppress their grins.
With his grey eyes and their coppery red hair that will never be as bright red as Natasha's, they fill his heart with warmth and pride whenever he looks at them.
He loves her even more for it, for giving him the life he didn't dare dream of when he thought she'd kill him in that warehouse all those years ago.
She laughs when he tells her, green eyes open and honest, "I owe you, Clint… more than I'll ever be able to repay."
Clint is seventy-seven when he dies for her, and he does it with a smile.
It's almost fifty-six years to the day they have first met, on a cold February morning. The location is another, America not Russia, New York not Yekaterinburg, but those are minor details.
She has told him to never again take a bullet for her – not in words, though that hardly matters – but Clint Barton is a stubborn man, and he didn't plan to follow that order from the moment she gave it.
The bullet would have gone straight into her heart. It doesn't hit his but just by millimeters, and he feels the blood pouring out of his chest when Natasha locks her gaze with his, a desperation in her eyes that hurts him more than the wound that is currently killing him.
She looks young, so incredibly young.
Time – with a certain help of the Tesseract – has been kind to him and Clint knows that there are many men at fifty that aren't as fit as he is currently, but that's still nothing compared to her. When they first met she looked to be in her early twenties, barely older than him, and now decades later she looks what… forty? Forty-one?
Even he doesn't know her real age, has never asked because it isn't important and it's obvious that she tries to forget it herself.
There are tears in her eyes, running down her checks in thick droplets and he has never seen Natasha cry … even now she is the most beautiful woman he has ever laid eyes upon.
She cradles his head in her hands, her skin soft against his and her fingers shaking. There is only one thing she has to say, the only thing she has never told him before. Her voice is a whisper, a caress to is soul, "I love you."
He has waited half a century to hear Natasha say these words and it was worth the wait.
Clint Barton doesn't know how other men die. He doesn't know if they are afraid of death, if they regret the things they have done in their lifetime… it isn't like that for him.
"I'll be waiting for you in the other place… try to not wreck too much havoc over here."
Neither of them believes in God, but that is his way of telling her that she won't dare die just because he isn't there to have her back anymore. She has other people to do that now. She isn't alone anymore.
"I promise." it's Russian he notices, his consciousness slipping.
He smiles, taking one last look at her beautiful green eyes before he closes his own.
There is no regret, no fear. Just love.
"So long, Tasha."
That's as close to romance as I'll ever get. If someone is interested in their mentioned first meeting in Yekaterinburg, it's uploaded in one of my stories called "A Different Call". Thanks for reading, I hoped you liked it.
Reviews are very much appreciated.