Cassidy Pandora Ryan wasn't a girl that drank until she couldn't remember her name, unless it involved her middle name, she hated that one. No, she enjoyed drinking on social gatherings or once in a while alone in her apartment while reading a good book, but there were a few situations in life that required one to drink their own body weigh in Whiskey. Today or the day before taking into consideration that it currently was 2:57 am, after blowing it up with a friend, be remembered by your older brother what a lousy sister and daughter you were, got dumped by your boyfriend and had 5 stitches in your hand kind of want to make forget for a while.

Currently she was on her bed looking absently at the ceiling of her bedroom, a bottle of Jack Daniels on her bedside table. She hadn't cry after her pathetic break down on the office. After making the doctor fix her hand she told Pepper she was going home for the rest of the day. Bless her, her boss didn't ask questions about it. She made it home and the first thing she did was to dive under her bed to take out one of the 3 bottles of Whiskey she had stock there since Caine had gave them to her.

The logical part of her brain told her that it wasn't a good idea, she had work in the morning and alcohol had never solved a damn thing in anyone's life but the other part…the one that usually shuts up your conscience said What the hell?. So, there she was, drunk out of her ass waiting for something to happen. Cassidy heard the door opened, she wasn't sure if it was Jessie or Elizabeth until she heard the door of Jessie´s room open. She got up, took the bottle in her hand thinking that maybe her friend would want to share a drink with her, the problem was the moment she opened the door, who she found standing in her living room was Clint.

"What the fuck are YOU doing here, Barton?" she stood still, the bottle of scotch lingering from her hand.

"I just dropped your friend there" he pointed to Jessica's door. "She had a run in with some…"

"You know what" the girl interrupted "Just shut up." She took a sip from the bottle and huffed in frustration as she realized it was empty. Who cares? There were two more from this one had come from. Cassidy closed the door behind her and started to walk towards the archer, poking one finger into his chest "I hope you are happy. Now I am just like you said I was."

"What are you talking about?"

The clueless expression on his face made her wanted to hurt him "Didn't you say that I have no right to talk about relationships because I wasn't on one?" her voice started to rise, anger fogging her mind. "Well, now I am not, so congrats for been right. I guess we should tell Fury I am not the only one with prediction powers around anymore." She turned around and headed towards the bedroom; picked her car and house keys from her dresser and slipped her feet into a pair of sneakers.

"The hell is the matter with these women?" he said to himself, but Cassidy quickly turned around on her heel and shut the door. Next thing he saw was the empty bottle coming at him and he quickly ducked, covering his head with his hands, the glass shattering behind him against the brick wall.

She walked up to the main door and took her jacket from a perch and pointed at Barton, who was still ducked on the floor "you better get the fuck out of here before I come back. Or the next bottle I throw won't miss its target" she hissed at him, closing the door behind her. She practically ran down the stairs and exited the apartment building but once outside she didn't know where to go. She had her car keys in hand but said vehicle was parked in the underground parking lot and the guard wasn't going to let her go anywhere in her state. Luckily for her, there was a cab parked at the end of the street.

"To Central Park." she said to the driver the moment she entered the car. It took her 10 minutes to get there. She handed the man a couple of bills, they could have been a couple of 20 or 100, she didn't care and the driver didn't say anything. It took her a while longer than the drive there to be able to locate the building she was looking for. Cassidy entered the place and rode the elevator to the 3rd floor. She walked until she was standing in front of the apartment 304 and tried for a while to open the door with her own key, sadly she was far too gone to be able to distinguish which was the right key.

It was at the time when the key ring slipped from her hands that Cassidy lost her patience and started pounding on the door "Open up". There were noises on the other side of the door as she kept pounding, not caring if she was making a scene. The door opened a couple of minutes later revealing a tall guy with black hair, black eyes and a expression a mixture of tiredness and irritability which change the moment he saw the girl in front of his home.

"Panda?"

"GOD, don't call me that!" Commented the girl while trying to bed to pick up her keys. "I am not enough drunk for this."

"Wow!" said the man placing his arm around her waist to prevent her to end up face on the ground. ""Thank God, last time you got really wasted you couldn't find your way out of your bed. Come inside, baby" he made their way into his home, the girl following without complain. He let her sat on the sofa before going back to the door, picking her keys and then locked his front door.

Caine Ryan was Cassidy´s older adoptive brother. As children, they had been very close. The older boy took care of the little thing that was his sister and enjoyed doing it. But as times passed they grew apart, he went to college and graduate as a kinder garden teacher and when she graduate too she started working for Stark industries and seamed to never had time for her family outside of an sporadic lunch date every other Sunday. Things got worse after Alex´s death. The last time he had seen her had been at their brother´s funeral, after the ceremony the girl had simply vanished. This was the first time he saw her in more than 6 months. HE took a long look, measuring the state of Cassidy form, her red eyes, her mess of a hair, the obvious stink of whiskey but most of all her posture, her complete body expression was screaming Please kill me and that scared the shit out of him. He left her things on the coffee table and sat next to her. He didn't talk, not sure of what to say let alone what the hell was happening.

She was the first one to break the silence "I am sorry" she whispered looking at the empty space.

"Don't be silly, Panda." he tried to assure her "You know you can come here whenever you like." he smiled waiting for her to look back. Eventually she did, her eyes shining with unshed tears.

"I am a bad person." she said out of the blue.

He pulled her into a tight hug, kissing the top of her head "Of course not, why do you even think that?"

"Because I ignore you and Alex, I hit people and made my boyfriend mad." Cassidy managed to say between hiccups.

Caine was dumbstruck buy that, he wasn't sure if this was her or the alcohol talking and wished that was the alcohol because if not he was going to hit something. He knew that of all the family, she was the one that mourned Alex´s death the most and also knew how hard but his sister wasn't a violent or bad person "Ok. Ok, you are going to have to calm down and tell me what happened because right now you are not making any sense."

And so she talked, she told him everything about what had happened the day before. She told him about her roommate and Clint, she told him the reason why she ignored him for so long. She even told him about Phil from the time she met him to the present. Of course, she omitted some important details, like who Clint really was and what did he and Phil work at. When she finished, she was lying across the couch, her head on his lap, eyes closed. Time passed slowly as Caine tried to analyze all the things she just said. On one hand he realized he didn't know anything about her, not really, the girl lying half asleep on his lap could be a perfect stranger for all he knew. On the other he wanted to rip this Phil person's head.

Funny how things worked, she just told him she assaulted a grown man she consider a friend, twice, that she had cut her hand with a piece of glass, which made her drinking dangerous because she had to be on painkillers, made a scene at work but the only thing he could think of was this Phil who was 20 years older that her, a coworker and her baby sister's former lover. GAH, lover, he wanted to throw up just by thinking of it. He wasn't a fool, he may always see Panda as the little baby his parents' brought home but he also knew she was now a woman, and with that came the "boyfriend" problem. What he couldn't stand was to think about the age difference, but most of all, about how things had gone down. For all she told him, it was up to this man to behave like an adult. Again, Pandora might be a 23 years old "adult" yet you can compare that to a 44 year old man. Which make that entire "relationship thing" weird. Why would his sister put up with someone who could be her father? She was a responsible, mature girl, yes, yet hooking up with someone who had to be way too set on his ways wasn't the smartest thing to do.

Caine sighed, he was not entitle to say anything about yet it was up to him to go kick some sense in this man´s head if necessary "Don't worry," he said still petting her head, "I will make things better."

Cassidy laughed softly. "That's why I have you."

The man stopped for a fraction looking at his sister had just closed her eyes but had a smile on her lips. "That´s right, baby Panda" he whispered leaning to kiss her on the forehead "I promise."