Chapter 36

Wanda was in the back seat next to her and was looking down on her with a smile on her face.

Ali had no idea why Wanda was grinning at her like that.

"Err hi?"

"They have no idea that we know that they were stalking us, and they don't yet know about Peter."

Wanda had said it through Ali's mind so that Natasha and Clint wouldn't overhear. What Wanda said definitely explained her expression.

"Please don't tell them about Peter!"

"I thought he wasn't your boyfriend so why would you care if I told them?"

"Everyone is going to come to the wrong conclusion which is what you are doing right now!"

"I won't tell them..."

Ali let out a sigh of relief, but Wanda had only taken a pause in her sentence to build up suspense.

"Yet."

The groan from Ali was unfortunately heard by both Natasha and Clint.

They both looked back at Ali in concern. They knew that her day hadn't been that bad as they had been watching her. That was why they were now trying to make sure that Ali didn't have feverish cheeks or anything to signal that she was unwell.

"I am fine and Uncle Clint you said that you had bought me something. Can I see it?"

That made them both revert their eyes back to the road.

"Oh, I was going to, but I couldn't find what I was looking for. How was school?"

"It was good, and I made a new friend called Maya. I want to tell her the truth."

"No!"

Natasha wasn't trying to be mean. She just couldn't risk her daughter's safety. The more people that knew about her the more she would be in danger.

"Mamma, she can read me almost as well as you can. She will find it out on her own at some point and I don't like lying to her. I want her to become my best friend but how can she become that when I am not telling her the truth? I only want to tell her about my family. That is, it."

Wanda had agreed with Ali from the start. None of Wanda's friends knew the truth but none of them really knew her like Maya and Ali knew each other and they had only met each other this morning.

Clint didn't want Ali to be put in danger but had seen the two's friendship for himself and knew that lies would tear the two apart. He did decided, however, not to get involved until he had all the facts. That meant that he was going to do his own background check on her.

Natasha had no idea how close Ali and Maya had become. She wasn't going to agree to it though without all the facts.

She sighed,

"If my background check comes up clean then invite her over for dinner next Saturday and tell her that we will pick her up and drop her off."

Ali nodded her head eagerly and felt a lot happier than she had been when she had first stepped into the car.

Once they had all arrived home, Ali got asked several times by everyone how her first day was and she always responded with the same one-word answers.

After getting fed up with hearing the same question asking over and over again, Ali headed to her room and took out her phone.

She opened it up to see that she had one notification on WhatsApp.

It was a message from Maya saying Hi. Ali responded back with a Hi and a smiley face before waiting for a reply.

After about a minute of waiting Maya had sent,

Do you know any memes?

No. What are they?

Ali's prediction earlier on in the car was becoming true. Almost every child on the planet that has access to the internet knows what memes are. Maya was starting to suspect that the past few years hadn't been kind to Ali.

Maya sent Ali a YouTube link and underneath it said,

These are my favourite memes all in one video :)

Ali clicked on the link and watched the 20-minute video on her phone. All of the memes brought at least smiles to Ali's face and most caused her to laugh.

After that the two chatted back and forth by texting. Just before dinner Natasha came into Ali's room and gave her a nod of approval.

Excitement quickly found Ali and she was practically buzzing.

Maya, would you like to come to my house for dinner on Saturday next week?

I would love to and can't wait!

Same, but is it okay if you could give me your Mum's phone number so that I can give it to my mum? And this is my mum's number.

Ali sent Natasha's number to Maya and sent Maya's mum's phone number over to Natasha.

I will send you my address and can you send me yours please.

Now Ali had hit a stump. She could send her address to Maya but as soon as she read it then she would either guess something that was completely wrong or think she was lying.

Can we FaceTime, please?

Sure :)

Ali pressed on the call button and after a few rings Maya picked up.

"I need to tell you something, but you have to promise me not to tell anyone. Not even your Mum."

"Ali, if you are safe and happy then I have no reason to say anything."

The smile on Maya's face was fake as she was really worried about her friend but didn't want to make her feel pressured into talking.

"I live at the Avengers tower."

Maya face changed to a look of confusion. This had not been what she was expecting to hear. In all honesty she wasn't even sure what she had been expecting but it wasn't this.

"So, your parents work there?"

"My mum does."

"What about your dad?"

"Don't have one and never have. My mum is called Natasha but everybody who doesn't know her calls her the Black Widow."

Once she had said it Ali felt a lot better.

"Why do they call her that?"

Ali almost laughed at her complete lack of knowledge about what was going on.

"My mum is the Black Widow!"

"No way!"

Maya's face was full of shock and excitement. She was best friends with the Black Widow's daughter!

"Please don't tell anyone but you will meet them all next Saturday anyways."

"Of course, I won't say anything, and I will find something to say to my mum, but I just need to ask you one more thing before I go."

"And what is that?"

"Does Tony Stark have a time machine I can borrow as I can't wait the 9 days until next Saturday!"

Ali laughed before saying her goodbyes and hanging up.

She left her room and headed towards the dining room where Bucky was placing some food in the middle of the table.

Once seated Ali actually gave a more detailed account of what happened at school rather than her usual one-word answers.

The rest of the evening flew past, and that night Ali was relieved to find that she didn't have a nightmare.

The next day was Friday. Both Wanda and Ali left the tower together and walked to school after they had both spent the last night pleading with Natasha.

The journey was uneventful, and Ali managed to meet Maya on time and the three of them walked into school together.

Luckily, today Ali didn't have French and the lessons that she did have flew by. Maya and Ali spent their break and lunch quoting memes at one another and Maya started showing Ali more of them.

By the end of the day, Maya was struggling to find a meme that she hadn't already shown Ali.

Ali kept the memes to herself when she got home as she was just waiting for the perfect moment to use them. Not that she knew it yet, but her perfect opportunity would come tomorrow.

After three nights in a row of peaceful sleeps Ali knew that it would all end at some point so wasn't surprised when she woke up in the middle of the night shaking.

The rest of the night Ali spent in and out of sleep. She never slept for more than 30 minutes at a time.

At 7am Ali deemed it late enough to get up so changed into some clothes and walked yawning to the kitchen where she got herself some breakfast.

After asking FRIDAY who was up, Ali went to go and find Tony. She asked FRIDAY to direct her to him and so stepped into the elevator when the doors had opened.

Ali had no idea how many floors she had gone down or even if she had been travelling up when the doors opened.

Her eyes were still bleary from the lack of sleep, but she could make out two figures standing a few metres in front of her.

Ali was under the impression that she was in Tony's lab since that was where he usually disappeared to. She decided to be nice to the two in front of her since if they were in Tony's lab then she would probably be seeing them again.

She rubbed her eyes before going over to the two and holding out her hand for them to shake.

"Ali."

The smaller of the two spoke before the other had a chance.

"Shuri."