Chapter fourteen
'Did you ever think we'd end up here?' Natasha asks Clint as he washes her hair. It's the middle of the afternoon but they just woke up and finished their breakfast. They both lost sleep last night due to nightmares and self loathing. The sex put their minds at ease and finally, in the early hours of the morning, they both fell asleep.
'What do you mean?' he responds softly.
'Us', he smiles at her shy question. He gently wipes the shampoo from her brow, preventing it from getting in her eyes.
'I think it was always there', he pauses to rinse her hair, 'in the back of my mind I always knew I was drawn to you. Remember the first time we truly connected?' She smiles and thinks back of the days in the air vent in Budapest. Three days they sat next to each other. Playing games, Clint talking about his girlfriend whom he just met and trying to figure Natasha out without pushing her past what she was comfortable with, set the base of their friendship. And eventually, their partnership.
'I remember', she smiles up at him.
'Those 72 hours were enough to make me care about you', he kisses her lips softly before continuing, 'you didn't say much and you didn't even have to. I saw the pain in your eyes. And I wanted to take that away. From day one all I wanted to do was be your friend, someone you could trust and turn to'.
'You became so much more to me. Even if I wasn't ready to admit that until Vormir'.
'I always knew, Tash. You are… everything to me. Always have been. I never wanted to burden Laura with the things we did, the things I did. But you always understood, never ran. If we weren't so hard headed we'd probably ended up together years ago', she laughs at his last statement.
'We always were good together', she smiles brightly at Clint. Clint laughs along with her.
'Come here', he holds her close and for a moment they forget the horrors of the last five years and just are happy together. They continue to share crazy memories of the years they've known each other. Both coming to the conclusion that this relationship has always been in the making.
Hours after they came out of the shower they're still naked on Natasha's bed. Simply holding each other and softly laughing with each other. Suddenly they realise that the sun is going down and when Clint takes a look at his alarm clock he sees it's already past 8 p.m.
'We don't have anything to eat, do we?' Clint asks. Natasha just shakes her head laughing.
'Let's just order in', he gets up and puts on a pair of boxers. Not bothering with anything else. Natasha grabs the first top she finds and puts it on before going over to Clint's room and grabbing a pair of his boxers as well. She comes down a few minutes after Clint.
'So it's either pizza or Chinese, the rest is already closed for ordering', Clint says as he looks up from his phone.
'Pizza it is then', she sits down next to him as they choose their pizza's.
'I'm just gonna check in with the kids, okay?' Clint says after they finished their order. He kisses her and gets up as he dials the number of Laura's parents. Natasha smiles as she watches him walk outside and hears him talk to his kids. Instead of staying on the couch she walks towards the kitchen to get them both something to drink. When she wants to open the fridge her eye catches something she hasn't seen before. A corner of a polaroid sticks out from under a drawing of Nathaniel. She gasps as she sees the picture. Tony, Steve, Bruce, Thor, Clint and Natasha herself are in the picture. Laughing out loud about something, she can't remember what. She does remember the night the picture was taken. Just before Ultron decided to crash the party. Natasha remembers how free and included she felt that night.
'What do you have there?' she suddenly hears behind her. She was so caught up in the memory that she didn't hear Clint come back in the house. She gasps and turns around startled. 'Sorry', he says softly as he walks over to her and takes the photo from her hands, 'ah, that was a great night', he smiles sadly.
'It was. Until Ultron', she whispers back. Clint wraps his arm around her and rubs her arms softly. I miss them she wants to say but is afraid of the emotions that will come up. So all Natasha does is sigh shakily.
'Me, too', he croaks softly. She looks up at him and sees his eyes are teary, she doesn't bother to keep hers at bay so she leans against his chest and allows herself to just feel for a moment. Suddenly Clint laughs softly.
'What?' Natasha asks as she wipes her cheeks dry.
'Just thinking about the look on Tony's face if he knew we're together', Natasha smiles and soon the tears from their eyes disappear. She takes the picture from his hands and gives it a more prominent place on the fridge.