This is a mistake.
From reading the letter to pursuing its author to coming here, to the safehouse that was a near-coastal bungalow she secured—it's all been a mistake. It's a mistake not because she regrets her pursuit, and it's not a mistake for the reasons it should be (namely, her husband). It's a mistake because now she's convinced that, along the way, misinterpreted something.
She must've misinterpreted something, because she's seated at one of two stools in the late morning light that fills the kitchen and he's not. He's late to her proposed rendezvous, which can only mean he's not coming. Somehow, that makes it all the more impossible for her to go home—not that there's really one to return to, she supposes.
If her life with Tom was the bliss he and everyone else thought it was, why would she be here, seeking an out from it? No, she shakes her head. It's not that. Her escape to this far-off corner of the world has nothing to do with Tom, the man she's married to, the one she's supposed to love.
She does love him. It just took losing another, different love for her to distinguish between the subspecies of deep compassion and care—familial, friendly, romantic. Her lack of experience with all three made her prone to exactly the kind of mistake she'd made with marrying. At least, that's what she's telling herself.
It took losing romantic love for her to identify it. It took Bruce running from her for her to finally chase him. It's not that she couldn't live without him, not like she couldn't live without air; it's that she didn't want to—doesn't want to. She wants Bruce like she could never want oxygen.
So she's here. In Indonesia. At 10:17 AM. She's here and Bruce isn't.
She's made a mistake.
10:18 to 10:23 pass through a tunnel of vertigo, distant nausea, and numbness in her feet. She grips the kitchen counter viciously to remind her body of gravity's hold. Her constricted chest wants to forget, disintegrate into ash and scatter. For fear of a grave emotional betrayal, her face emulates stone. Becoming a rock or a tree or something else inanimate would be so much better than this.
She grinds her fingertips into the grit of the counter's underside and focuses on the lifeless, immobile things she'd rather be. That's how she keeps breathing, keeps from collapsing. That's how she holds herself together until Bruce materializes in the hallway behind her.
"Nat."
Her name hits her back and it's like someone telling her the truth for the first time in her near-forty years of life. Somewhere, there's gratitude. It's buried with the mutterings of logic underneath a tsunami of being simply overwhelmed.
Still, she can't help but look at him. What he sees must worry him, because the stars in his eyes dim. "I'm sorry—I—"
She walks away without knowing why.
From the counter to the kitchen's glass doors, it doesn't feel like she occupies herself. Her body is a vacant, numb place, and she, a displaced entity, is anywhere but there. Really (following this thin line of logic), she's anywhere but anywhere, adrift in a nebula of shock.
Behind her, in a tangible place, Bruce says, "Natasha." After her, through the kitchen and out the doors, he follows and calls, "Natasha."
She rounds the corner of the enclosed backyard, the ground of which is entirely hard tile. The ground feels harsh underneath her bare feet. With each step, it feels as though the ceramic retaliates with a broad slap. There's a whirlwind in her chest, and concrete in her limbs. There's her fleeing, and Bruce pursuing her with questions. The irony of that isn't lost on her.
"Am I missing something?"
Petty and trite as it is, she lets herself snark, "Being on time?" To offset the brusqueness, though, her pace slows. There's also the fact that she's a few strides away from walking onto the streets of Balikpapan shoeless.
Behind her, he concedes, "I know, I'm late. I shouldn't have been, but…" The smack of his shoe soles on the tile cease. "So you're leaving?"
His tone is more bereft than accusatory. It acts as a harsh catalyst for her nonetheless. It might be the start of a chain of actions she'll later regret, but she too stops, turns, opens herself to him. "You're the one who left."
"I—yeah," he says, a faint shadow of a wince in his voice. "You were getting married."
"I am married. And I'm here." She delivers these facts like news of a natural disaster—with an atmosphere of grimness and inevitability.
"That's why I was confused when you–-"
Yet again, in an act that she can't even fully explain to herself, she cuts in, "I need to go home." She says this, yet doesn't move, doesn't turn from him.
"Why?"
"Because I shouldn't be here."
He looks at her, gaze thirsty, like a desert nomad begging for water. Quiet but firm, he admits, "But I want you to be here."
Once, for a long time, the winds of the world would've stopped if he'd said that to her. Now, however, they exist in the era of his abandonment.
She challenges him, "Then why do you keep disappearing without me? Sokovia, Wakanda, my wedding—"
"Because I thought you were—I don't know, that you wanted space. And then you were getting married, and I didn't want to hurt you anymore—"
"Well, that's exactly what you did."
As the tension rises, the words between them as it feels, the city ebbs on in its many forms, humming, gusting, an afternoon shower probably brewing somewhere. For long seconds suspended outside of the bustling general population, the two of them remain stagnant.
In the back of her mind, she wonders who's now doling out more of the hurt.
Bruce ventures to break the stillness, but in the wrong way. "So why—" He stops himself before he gets further into the question, but it's too late to prevent him from getting a death glare from her. Through daggered eyes, she asks, You're a smart man, don't act like you don't know why I'm here now. Don't act like you don't know what would compel me to track you down, arrange to meet with you, and plan to stay here for more than 24 hours.
Perhaps detecting this, he revises,"Why do you have to leave?"
Admittedly getting them nowhere, she shoots right back, "Why did you?"
An isolated pause claims the space between them again. At least it's shorter this time, and he's bolder in breaking it.
"I'm sorry," he says. Out of his hands, he wrings lament, then finds stillness and stability in pressing his palms together. "I'm not any good at this. I didn't think I'd have to be."
She wishes he was. Thinking that was fairly obvious and perhaps a bit spiteful to say, she keeps the notion to herself. Without it, though, she's left without a response. There's still the option to walk away, yet it doesn't feel like there's a clear path forward—away from this, rather. In all situations, she's the one who knows how to proceed when there's a hang-up—all situations except for this one.
Thankfully, this is one time she doesn't have to be a catalyst for movement. As plain as the moon eclipsing the sun, Bruce wrestles with the persistent beasts of conflict and self-loathing. It's a battle he wins, which is evident in the subtle yet firm resolve that settles his fraught expression, in the steps he takes toward her.
Ever careful, ever gentle, he shortens the space between them, offering another apology, "I'm so sorry—"
"I was ready to run with you." Even now, when faced with exactly what she wants—who she wants—her own demons can't help but make it difficult for her. More than that, though, it's the activation of some latent self-defense mechanism—like ruthless guards that come to fend for her.
Holding nothing against her, he admits, "I know."
Incredulous at this, she recoils—emotionally and physically—from their proximity. "You knew and you left?"
"No, I—" Verbally, he stumbles over himself. "I didn't know then, but I know now and…" He stops when he looks at her, sees something—probably the incredulous exasperation—and the little sureness he has deflates. From the corners of his eyes inward, he crumples, a subterranean implosion. "Is it...am I too late to fix things?"
Despite the immediate jolt of protest from her chest and gut, she murmurs, "I don't know." It's easier to say that than to put into words the conflicting desire to have him this close, to pull him to her, and addressing the hurt. Trying to keep him near, to resolve the duality between her wants, she utters, "You left me."
Too literal—and, judging by his sheepishness, aware of the folly—he mutters, breathy, "You had the others."
"You know what I mean," she responds, not admonishing, but quiet and firm—a monsoon that may yet pass.
Shame barrages him, crashes down onto his head and shoulders, lades his eyes so much that they go downcast. The way her hands itch to touch him, to lift him back up and tell him it's okay, they can talk about this—it could make her believe that humans are magnetic or, at least, that some souls are.
More to the ground than her, he says, "I thought you'd be better off with—"
Before he can drop her husband's dreaded name like a grenade, she cuts in, "Don't even go there." Trying to beckon him back to her without touch, she bends down in an attempt to catch his gaze. Then he would see that she's not fuming or chastising, she's pleading, "It's supposed to be my decision, Bruce. You took that away."
"I thought—with the lullaby—"
"Fuck the lullaby. You were always my decision. Me wanting to be with you wasn't about obligation." She flares, spewing embers and hot oil. Before she cools, she adds, "It was a decision you took from me."
It's clear from how his face flinches that she's stung him. "I thought it'd be better—"
"For what? For me to forget you? Forget how I felt about you?"
As hard as it is to say and see it hurt him, hearing it, absorbing it is worse. She'd know; she was in his shoes the day of her wedding—the wedding to someone who wasn't, isn't him. The wedding she had because Bruce pulled the choice away from her like a rug from under her feet.
He's trying to make amends for it now, though. It's in his tightrope voice, thin and fighting for steadiness, the remorse clawing into his expression with its talons, the slight shift back from his arches to his heels. Though he sounds afraid of the answer, he asks, "Have you?" He means: has she forgotten?
"I'm pretty damn close right now."
But it's not revenge she's after; it's him. This whole trip, finding him and the risks associated with it, it's all been for him and, indirectly, out of respect for herself and her long-suppressed feelings.
But a person worth respect wouldn't do this, or so she thinks. A person worth respect wouldn't pursue a love different from the one they were already committed to, wouldn't have lied to their spouse and ventured to an archipelago across the globe to meet said love. And a person worth respect certainly wouldn't stand inches away from someone who isn't their spouse and spar with the want—the years-old want—to kiss that person, to hold them and be held by them. There's that persistent voice in her that reminds her, has reminded her since her assassin and KGB days, that she's not a person who does things worth respecting. So why, she thinks, does she deserve to get what she wants, what she's craved for years, especially when her methods have been so duplicitous?
While the self-deprecation and loathing buck and rear in her mind, Bruce hangs in silence. From it, he pulls another hesitant, quiet question, "Do you want me to leave?"
If he leaves, the decision's made for her. She could go back to New York, to Tom, and pretend she's worth a good person like the one she married. Or she could cut her losses and start laying a different groundwork for herself.
To answer him, she cools herself to softness. "What do you think?" Then—because if she, if they, are going to do this, they're going to do it right—she asks, "What do you want?"
Those talons of regret lighten their grip on the corners of his face. His arms twitch—probably his hands' compulsion to fidget—but they're too close at this point. To bring his hands between them would be to touch her.
Instead, he glances down, tries to refresh his expression. When he returns to her, he makes a bittersweet quip, "A time machine."
Somehow, they both find the capacity to chuckle at that, despite the brutal truth latent in the sentiment. That she resolves by pulling him into a hug. It's a familiar gesture that she's done with him, with the other Avengers boys, with a plethora of people in her life. For her, at least, it achieves the same as a sigh dissipating tension. Here, now, it also pulls and anchors him back into the folds of her life.
He tells her, "I'm so sorry."
To him, to herself, she murmurs back, "Me too." When she closes her eyes in the moment before she lets go, there isn't a choice in front of her, in front of them—there isn't the possibility of walking away from this and losing him all over again. There's him. Just him and their souls responding.
But, after that, she does pull away. They can't stay there forever, can't freeze the world and time around them, become statues locked in a marble embrace.
When they return to their respective spheres of self, close though they remain, neither of them knows where to pick up or where to run next. What's before her feels less like a choice and a fight with the demons that scrutinize her through a sniper scope.
Bruce surprises her by speaking first, "So...is this…" There's no way for her to be sure without touching, but his mouth quivers and she swears she feels how his pulse turns rapid. Hers does too as he says, "Do we forget? About the lullaby, the past—everything?" Torturously unspoken, he asks, Do we forget each other?
Something about him giving voice to the option makes it too tangible for comfort. In her mind's figurative battlefield, she looks her demons in the eye and, their lethal aim be damned, she stops fighting. Disintegrating the space between them, she puts her hand on his heart, which is racing, sure enough.
He glances down at the place of contact but doesn't avoid her gaze for too long. Even if he doesn't intend to meet her eye, his emotions are etched into his features like words in stone. The cracked dam of his face is as plain to her as her own reflection in a mirror. Before he breaks, she catches him, slides her hand up to cradle his face.
Her earlier, angrier words echo in her—probably in him too. Fuck the lullaby. The mere notion of that now almost breaks her too.
"I don't…" Her stare falls to his mouth, which is ajar with heavy, self-soothing breaths. What she's about to say deserves to—needs to be said looking him in the eye. So she looks there. She says, "I don't want to forget our lullaby." And she kisses him.
He is solid and warm and incredibly real against her. There's the scent of him overlaid with sunscreen, the damp beginnings of sweat on his skin. His chin and jaw are smooth, probably shaved earlier this morning. His hands find a light grip on her lower ribcage, pressing into her like butterfly feet on a tree.
The only thing surreal about him, about their kiss is his instant melt into her, like layers of the sky blurring into multifaceted union with parts that can only be approximated— thermosphere, mesosphere, stratosphere. Though they've only kissed once before, years ago, her pressed against him feels more like a home than anywhere else ever has.
Between breaths, she pulls away mere centimeters—just enough for him to see her whole face, and her his. In the sojourn from their embrace, she affirms, "I want you. And I don't want you to ever forget that."
His nose brushes along hers when he nods. Something in both of them can't help but interpret it as an invitation to come back together. They gravitate and lean; latch, release, and rejoin. The longer they go on, the deeper into each other they go, hands shifting, heads tilting, mouths opening, pressure applying in all the right ways. She could do this for hours, and definitely wants to, but not on the cusp of public view. Besides, wonderful as this is, it opens a new network of discussions they have to review and navigate. At least they'll do it together now.
When she falls back, he chases her. Warmth blooms in her, and she stays them both with a half-second kiss. The smile that emerges from her is insuppressible, as is the slight buoyance that makes her overcompensate and lower her voice to a husky whisper, "Come on."
She encloses one of his hands in one of hers, brings it to her mouth and kisses it like a rosary lost and recently found. Joined, she leads them back inside.
The shift of the sun-cast shadows in the kitchen is her sole method of timekeeping as she and Bruce talk through the rest of the morning. They weather through the aftermath of their earlier dispute together, remaining by each other's side, cleaning and cauterizing wounds so they don't scar, papering over the old history written into them and waiting for the glue to settle in a new mold. Seated at the kitchen table, they talk over joined hands and glasses of water, verbally meander and traverse through their shared past, what Bruce has been busying himself with over the past months. The entire time, they flirt with a mutual future without diving too deep, never venturing beyond heavy suggestions and brief, glittering stares.
While they could dwell for a small eternity in shared reverie, the overcast of the nearing future looms, making blissful, mindless conversation progressively difficult. Finally, at no point in particular, a lull hits them. Silence possesses Bruce when he trails off on a memory involving Wakanda. The mission culminated to a decisive clash with Thanos which was, needless to say, noteworthy. For her, that mission also started with Bruce and a shred bed, and ended with her meeting Tom.
Prolonged quiet feels like waiting for lightning, so she asks, "What're you thinking?" For good measure, she lightly squeezes his hand.
In his chair, he leans back, seethes a breath through a tight grin. He says, "Something I don't either of us want to talk about."
While their mutual grasp doesn't waver, her gaze drops. "Yeah," she admits, knowing. She doesn't let go of him, but not without a fraught conscience—Tom trusts she's out on an assignment and, in a way, she is, but not how he thinks. Somehow, she doesn't think that he—her husband, technically—believes any mission of hers would end like this: with leaving her for another man. Soon enough, though, he'll have to believe it. Her flight back to the States, to him, is in two days' time.
Just above a murmur, Bruce confirms, "We're both thinking about what happens after, right?"
Her bittersweet tone strong enough to taste, she just says again, "Yeah."
"I'm sorry." This time, the squeeze comes from him.
Maybe it should be harder to meet his gaze and smile into it, but it isn't. "Don't be. We need to talk about it," she assures him. Meanwhile, the flight details hang in her mind like a prison sentence. The muscles in her cheeks falter. "Well, I just need to do it. It's my mess."
"I kind of put you in it," he says. His hand withdraws from hers and he sits back. Sheepishness emanates from him like a beacon. "Not kind of."
Propping an elbow on the table and her head upon that same arm, she jokes, "Do you wanna split the blame?"
They're both able to smile at that, which is a good sign, she thinks. Bruce breathes a laugh, tensions unwinding in his neck and shoulders a little. "Yeah, that sounds good."
"Alright. We'll draw straws on who tells Tom, then." In her head, the jest seemed fine, but she can see it doesn't land as intended, panic echoing like thunder in Bruce's eyes. Apologetically, she clarifies, "I'm joking."
"No, I can. I will if you want me to."
Of course he'd offer that. The notion of it—a confrontation between Bruce and Tom—unsettles her before the appreciation and adoration of the sentiment hits. A little too solemn, she responds, "No. That's something I have to do."
Distance creeps in—she can feel it, Bruce can see it. The monumental problem that awaits her on the other side of the globe robs her from the present, dulls her precious euphoria. Concern knits his eyebrows together. He stares at her face, searching.
Speaking to Bruce, but mentally half a world away, she says, "My flight back's in two days. I'll do it then. For now, I just wanna…" Her head shakes off the burden, shakes at herself. An arm comes to rest on the table. When her head collapses, she catches herself in an open palm. Just breathing easy requires permission from herself, and she's not a lenient warden.
Much more sympathetic, at least to her (not always himself, though), Bruce brings ease to her through a touch on her back. Just his fingers press into her, pressure firm but not too much as he rubs a rainbow path across her spine and shoulder blades. The pattern and sensation hook her back into the present, where she has him. After so much time, they have each other. She's chased him, he's offered to drop everything and break another person's heart for her. She's kissed him, he's touched her, is touching her. They have each other.
Sinking into him feels like one of the simplest, easiest things she's ever done. As she leans, he—in his dorky, awkward way—scooches his chair closer so she can properly rest her forehead on his shoulder. The slope of her nose lands against him in such a way that reminds her of puzzle pieces. Contrived as it sounds, she can't help but feel like they're two parts that fell into place near each other, only needing a little push to find their matching edges.
As she's thinking of that, slightly nuzzling into him, a guttural squelch emerges from Bruce's midsection.
Her eyes, which had fallen shut, open and, as if in response, Bruce's stomach rumbles its famished protest again, louder the second time.
She quirks a brow at his embarrassed expression. "Hungry?"
Lowly, he admits, "A little."
With a general nod, she offers her kitchen's stock to him. "I have food. Help yourself."
After tracing one final arc across her back, he rises to begin his search. It's oddly soothing, watching him peruse the cabinetry of her kitchen—temporarily hers, but nonetheless—with increasing confidence and casualness. It's a solace she lets herself have, observing him, making no analysis, drawing no conclusions.
Eventually, with a jar of peanut butter in each hand—one crunchy, one smooth—he turns to her. "Do you have any real food?" He asks, more confused than judgmental.
"None of that's fake," she teases, referring to the jars in his hand, the sustenance in her freezer, the loaf of bread sitting right before him.
To emphasize his point, he sets the jars down so they bookend the loaf. All in good nature, he insists, "This doesn't count."
"Don't tell me you don't know how to make a sandwich."
"I—no, that's not what I mean—" He sputters, looking around as though he's genuinely missing something, the goof. When he realizes she means he has the components for a perfectly good peanut butter sandwich, he protests, "There's not even jelly."
With the air of a chessmaster going in for checkmate, she lifts her ankles onto the table, crosses them, says, "You mean pure processed sugar? That's not good for you, doc."
He breaks then, a big grin cracks the lighthearted incredulty across his face. It's a contagion of ebullience that quickly spreads to her, injects her with the desire to kiss him again, this very moment. More than that, though, there's the dangerous temptation to disappear with him today, to run and cover their tracks so no one from their shared past can ever contact them. It's dangerous, the wants that bloom and multiply in her. The rest of their lives could be days like this: bantering over meals, playfully poking and prodding each other, catching and anchoring each other when they may stumble or fall.
Soon, she reminds herself. Once she tells Tom—once she ends things with him—they can return to this, and it'll be a true state of bliss.
Still surveying the peanut butter and bread, unaware of her thoughts, Bruce says, "I have some stuff—I have food, real food, at my place." The look shed upon her is one that asks permission. "Is it okay if I go?"
"I'm not holding you hostage," she replies, rolling the Achilles of one ankle over the top of the other.
Taking the quip a bit too seriously, he stammers, "No, I know—I didn't—" He stops, restarts. "'Do you want to come with me' is what I'm trying to say."
There was a time in her life when she would've teased others for the jump her stomach does in response to the sentiment. How far she's come.
"I thought you'd never ask," she jokes slyly, legs lowering back to the ground. She gets up, heads over to him, waits for him to lead the way.
He doesn't, though. The hesitation in his body language is heavy, as is the gaze that settles on her. Everything about him feels close and clear except for his eyes. Somehow, it's as though just those are underwater, sodden and sinking away, giving up on floating. To say the very least, it's worrying, but she doesn't press him before he's ready.
When he is, he does tell her, "I know I sound like a broken record, but I keep saying it because I mean it," he says, "I'm sorry. For everything, for hurting you, for pushing you away." His stare drops to the floor, as though she's something precious he's ashamed to admire and touch like he wants. The sheer notion of that—of being special, precious to someone—is still novel and surprising to her after all these years.
"I wanna make it up to you. There's a lot to make up for, but I wanna try," he vows. After a tentative false start, his hand reaches for one of her hers. His fingers curl around hers like gentle question marks. Fixed on that, their joined grasp, he continues, "But if you ever want...if you don't want—"
She knows where he's going and knows that she doesn't need to hear it, doesn't need it said. And, honestly, the more he goes on, the deeper he digs himself into the catastrophic pits of anxiety and doubt in his brain. So she pulls him out. She shuts him up, reassures him with a fast and firm kiss. To the questions asked through the hand latched onto hers, she responds by cupping his cheek and anchoring his mouth there, steadying.
"Don't forget, remember?" She murmurs, grinning at so many things—the sentiment, how they've already slipped back into a shared secret code, being here, letting herself be here. They'll both continue to be here—in the space they create and define for each other. That much is certain.
With that sureness, she says, "Let's go."