AN: This is another one of my chapters that I wrote and rewrote, and rewrote again. I knew I wanted to incorporate Clint's family and how that played into things between Clint and Natasha, and I will fully admit I used a lot of personal experience in how I view/justify their actions/reactions in this head-cannon. How Natasha dealt with it was actually more difficult for me, and the reason for quite so many rewrites.

Hopefully people enjoy it. I may be actually seeing a true end to this somewhere soonish.

The transition from target to teammate wasn't an easy one for Natasha. SHIELD agents were understandably hesitant about her, and the feeling was mutual. A basic level of trust was necessary to be able to effectively function and she lacked that with everyone. Well, everyone except Clint. She supposed that was really the only person she needed to trust her anyway.

Clint stayed with her in her new quarters. This did not help the rumors that abounded: Clint had only spared Natasha for some sort of sexual gratification. She didn't much care about the rumors – much worse things had been said about her, and she would have slept with Clint if it had been the price. He typically ignored it, unless it came from Coulson or Fury, which earned them a sharp glare, but no other admonishments.

She figured he stayed to make sure she didn't either make a run for it, or blow up the base when he was gone. She was his responsibility and he was going to babysit her until they had more trust established.

He actually stayed because he was worried she would wake up at night and not know where she was or have a nightmare. He cared about her. Clint's feelings weren't entirely chaste, but there were so many barriers and boundaries that he could not, would not cross. If not for his own reasons, for Natasha's protection as well. He didn't know some of the more graphic details, but he knew enough, and sometimes too much. So, he carefully kept his behavior and thoughts as platonic as possible. They were going to be partners, which meant a close relationship and that was going to be enough; it had to be enough.

One night after her acceptance into SHIELD, after a particularly bad nightmare, Clint watched as she tossed and turned trying to get back to sleep. He noted that she finally only settled down when she laid on her left side with her right arm straight up, resting on the wall with elbow locked. She didn't move again for the remainder of the night. When she woke up there was momentary fear and dread in her expression and quickly brought her arm back down, Clint giving her a questioning look but not asking for anything then.

After they had eaten and done an initial workout for the morning, Natasha turned to him and abruptly said, "There was always a bar above our bed that we were handcuffed to at night."

Clint blinked at the admission. "What?"

"You gave me a look last night about how I slept." Her tone was annoyed and mildly defensive.

"You're right. I did. I was curious." He frowned though, processing the words she had said. "So that's your comfort position." He said it sadly, with empathy but not pity, thankfully. He had his own position that he tended to revert to when nightmares came.

He cleared his throat. "I have hearing loss in my right ear." Natasha actually was startled to hear it. "It's not enough to disqualify me now, but when I was a kid, I was usually deaf in that ear. My dad would box my ear to wake me up if he was pissed." Clint shrugged at her frown. "I learned to sleep on my left side to protect my good ear. And keep a hand over my right to maybe block a hit in the dark."

Natasha didn't reply with anything more than a nod. They both went back to their tasks, neither comfortable with the discussion. She knew he had shared to balance out what she had told him, so she wouldn't feel exposed. She was thankful for that.

That night she realized he installed a hook with a soft loop of fabric above her bed. When she looked back over at him, he shrugged. If it made it easier to sleep, he wanted to facilitate that and her being as comfortable as possible while doing it. He wasn't about to judge her coping mechanisms.

"Do you actually ever sleep?" Natasha frowned at Clint one night when she woke up from a particularly painful nightmare. As always, he was there and awake beside her to speak soft words. She was going through the SHIELD-mandated therapy and psychological testing, and she was actually trying to participate so she could make it through this transition.

A sad smile from the man beside her. "Yeah, enough."

She remembered him telling her that he had more nightmares when he wasn't on assignment. "What helps yours?" She was honestly curious. It wasn't heartening to think that these were going to be a more permanent part of her life.

"Exhaustion. Focus on a mission. Being somewhere I feel safe." He turned his head to look at her in the darkness. "Certain things bring them back to the surface and make it harder. Watching you go through this reminds me a lot of when I did." It wasn't accusation or blame, but explanation.

"I'm sorry." He nodded in response to her words, knowing she was trying to express sympathy for the fact he had to relive his recruitment.

He debated whether to speak again, unsure if he was pushing too hard. "They've changed a bit for you, though." She didn't talk in her sleep, but he was getting to know her body language even better with time, and there seemed to be more actual fear from the nightmares over the last few days. When she dreamt of things she'd done, she awoke almost angry. Those were the nights that she tended to use her arm loop to get back to sleep, to revert to the person who wasn't bothered by those acts. When the others came, she would never put her arm up.

"It's so wonderful that my subconscious mind has so many vivid options to choose from." Natasha's voice wasn't annoyed, just resigned. "Tonight was about when I was little." She didn't continue, he didn't push. A pause, thinking back on earlier words. "You said that when you felt really safe, you didn't have as many nightmares. Do you get to that level of safety often?" Her voice was tinged with hope.

For some reason, a guilty look flashed across Clint's face, before he hid his emotions again. "Not as much as I should," he said very softly. Tipping his head back and cracking his neck before saying anything else, clearly debating how much to say to the woman next to him. "I have a family."

The admission shocked Natasha more than probably anything else he could have said. She knew enough about his history that his parents and brother were dead. "You mean..." She honestly struggled to wrap her mind around what he was saying. Not just because it was unbelievable, but because although she would never admit it, it caused a sharp pain in her chest.

"No-one except Fury, Coulson and now you know. It has to stay that way." He was also feeling an uncomfortable pain, one he would be just as unlikely to admit.

"Why are you telling me?" she whispered. It was insane to think about. There was no benefit to it. It showed a level of trust that she wasn't sure was well-placed. Some horrible ideas and thoughts had flitted through her mind when he first spoke.

A long pause as he considered the question. "We're partners now." His eyes went down to her hand to ask permission to touch it. She twitched a pinky in his direction to grant it.

"So is she." That was the closest she would ever come to admitting jealousy. But partnership in both of these situations required a level of commitment that could often be in conflict with each other.

Clint looked away. "It's not that easy." His face settled into a deep frown. "We met before, when I was a kid. We both were escaping issues." He sighed. "It's definitely not a normal marriage."

"You're actually married?" This was so surreal to Natasha.

"It was important to her before our son was born." His voice was quiet and held a hint of pain. Natasha's hand pulled out from under his.

Natasha sucked in a breath. Son. Clint had a son. She didn't say anything, not trusting her voice. She wanted to be unaffected by all this disclosure. She wanted for it to not matter to her or hurt this much. But it hurt more than she could ever explain. She had reconciled what had been done to her, and what her career was, meant that she would never have a family and though she knew that Clint hasn't been raised in the same environment, she figured that assassin and family didn't mix, no matter the upbringing.

"I have a daughter too." In for a penny, in for a pound. He needed to get this all out. He wasn't naïve enough to claim he didn't feel the chemistry between them, to know that they were closer than normal, that there wasn't a draw between them. He wouldn't act on it, but if he was honest, that was as much because of Natasha as his wife. "They are five and three."

She nodded numbly. "What's her name?" Her voice was still very soft, hiding the emotion there.

"Laura." He wanted to explain so much to Natasha, about how it happened and what their relationship was, truthfully. But he knew that in this moment it wouldn't make this conversation any easier. Hopefully, he would be able to explain to her later, if they were not breaking some part of the connection they had irrevocably right now.

Slow breath in and out. She wanted to be angry for him not telling her sooner, but she also was shocked he told her at all. "I need to process this," she finally said.

He understood what that meant - she didn't want him next to her right now. He was not providing comfort or help. He stood up, knowing he made a huge gamble by trusting her with this information, knowing to her it would feel like a betrayal. Part of him wanted to stay and watch to make sure she didn't go after them, but he knew that was pointless. If she wanted them dead, no amount of watching would change that and he would damage their already weakened trust by insinuating it.

"Good night, Natasha." Clint couldn't look at her, his own feelings too chaotic to deal with. He needed to process too apparently.

"Good night, Clint."

He hoped like hell that it wasn't as final as it seemed in that moment.

They avoided each other the next day, both uncomfortable with the feelings that had been stirred by the situation. Clint did go to Coulson's office to let him know.

"You know we have lawyers that could have helped you with this." Phil's annoyed response seemed like a non-sequitur.

"Helped with what?" Clint tried to figure out Coulson's angle.

"Divorce would not have been difficult to arrange, we could have set her up. But to do this and put your kids at risk?" Phil shook his head, disappointment and disgust in his expression.

"I don't want her dead!" Clint exclaimed angrily. Phil arched a brow incredulously at him. "I know you don't yet, but I trust Natasha. She's not going to hurt them."

"Pretty big throw of the dice though, isn't it?"

"It was something I know would have come out to her eventually. We're partners." He ran a hand through his short hair. "It would be worse to wait longer."

"You didn't have to ever tell her! You are a spy for fuck's sake, Clint." Phil was beyond exasperated.

"You know I did," Clint said quietly, looking at the far wall.

"Jesus Christ. You swore to me. You swore that this whole thing wasn't about that!" Now Phil was genuinely angry. Angry at Clint for being so stupid, on behalf of his wife and angry that he was going to have to deal with the fallout.

Sharply, "It isn't." He shook his head, his own sheer and frustration about the situation boiling over. "It isn't about that. That isn't why I brought her in. You must think very fucking little of me if you really think that's why I brought her in." He gave Phil a challenging glare, with the older man looking away first, knowing that Clint was better than that, but still angry.

"Laura and I..." He sighed. "We'll never cross the line. No matter what, I won't do that to Laura."

Coulson struggled with this. He was a father figure to Clint and he knew it. He also knew that Hawkeye's marriage was complicated. Being the agent's handler, he knew exactly how much Clint did or did not go home. "Do you want to talk about it?" He tried to push down his judgment.

Clint slouched down into a chair. "I can't talk to Laura about most things. She doesn't know what I do, what I did. I know that doesn't excuse anything. But we met when we were sixteen for fuck's sake. Both with enough mommy and daddy issues to keep a team of therapists in business for decades. The first one was an accident. I knew she wanted a second baby, and I figured if it made her happy..."

"That's a pretty shitty reason to have a child," Phil said mildly.

"I know," Clint snapped. "It wasn't just that. It's nice to be able to pretend. To pretend that there could be more. But when I'm there, I'm playing a role. I'm Clint, the father and husband and sometimes it's exhausting."

"But you made the choice to do it." Phil was trying to be helpful to his protégé, but part of that was not letting him of the hook so easily.

"Yeah. I did. And maybe I'm wondering if that was the wrong choice. I was desperate to have something that I never had, so I settled on the closest I thought I could get." His voice cracked with pain. They had both settled. Laura wanted out of the circus. She wanted safety and security and children. He could give that to her, but he couldn't be there most of the time.

"Is she happy?"

"Honestly? I'm not sure. Maybe some day what I can give won't be enough for her. But right now we go through the motions and it seems to be enough." Clint hated himself in that moment. He had made some bad decisions, and there was no escaping that.

"Maybe you should ask her." Phil felt a pang of sympathy for all involved.

"Maybe. But I don't think I want to know the answer," he admitted with guilt.

Phil put a hand on Clint's shoulder. "I'm sorry." It was an ugly situation from every angle. Clint had no great options. Coulson could understand the desire for both sides of the coin: someone untouched by the ugliness of the job, and someone who could share the burden. "My only suggestion, is to not rush into anything."

Clint nodded and stood. The status quo had been like this for years, even before Natasha came into his life, and there was no reason to change it immediately.

After Clint left, there were a lot of thoughts in Natasha's mind, many of them she wasn't even sure how to approach. She didn't normally like to do this in the day when there were potentially people around, but it was soothing and distracting. She grabbed her things and headed to the gym.

She found a sub-room easily, locked it and hung an extra towel over the window, another over the camera hidden in the corner. She did not want an audience for what she was going to do. She finished getting ready and then hit 'play' on the small music player she had.

Ballet was not something she practiced frequently anymore, but it had been part of her training in the Red Room. It gave the girls balance and grace, helped ensure their muscles were long and lithe and not compact and visible. It wasn't the same as the training cute little girls get in Russia; it was far more harsh and unforgiving, but in the end, she was a beautiful dancer. Like many things from that time, they felt the ends justified the means. She didn't know if they really did, but she couldn't change the past.

Dancing allowed her to put Clint out of her conscious mind, relegating him to the far corners as her mind concentrated on the pull of each muscle and the form of her movement. Her subconscious could gnaw at her feelings about the situation as she used the one form of emotional expression that was encouraged by her upbringing.

It was easy for her to lose track of time in the room; that was actually the point. When she was dancing, she wasn't in a SHIELD facility, she wasn't even in the Red Room. She was just dancing in a space where part of her was able to be free.

Natasha was actually too lost in her music to hear the key in the lock, but she did feel the rush of air when the door opened. It was Clint, a worried frown on his face. She looked up at the clock; it had been over 6 hours since she first stepped in the room. She didn't feel ready to leave though, and so she began dancing again.

Clint watched her movements, seeing some of the emotions running through them: pain, confusion, fear and yet still happiness. He opened his mouth to speak but Natasha shook her head and glanced at his shoes. He toed them off, allowing her to take his hand to lead him to the middle of the room.

She used his presence to perform the movements she couldn't alone, surprised though when he was able to provide more help than she expected. He smiled and shrugged slightly, mouthing the word 'circus'. While he was no trained dancer himself, he had been exposed to much of this from one of the other acts, in addition to the acrobats that often incorporated dance into their show.

They danced slowly and carefully together, Clint far more unsure of his movements than she was. But they made it work, and if someone could have seen it, they would have thought it was beautiful. It was just for the two of them though, a way to move on from the admissions that Clint had made.

Natasha's subconscious finally allowed her to realize that likely nothing was going to change between the two of them. There was a connection and it didn't seem like either of them were willing to give it up, and however that played into Clint and his relationship with his family, that was not for her to judge.

Later, as Natasha and Clint reclined in bed, she finally spoke to him again. "When's the last time you went home?"

The guilty look flashed on his face again. "Right before the mission where I brought you in." He paused, thinking about what to say next. "Laura and I met in the circus when we were kids. She worked the high-wire. When we met, it was before …" Before he started killing people for money, the words left unsaid.

"Does she know?"

He sighed. "No. She knew the kind of people I spent time with though. I doubt she wants to know."

"Most of your life with her is a lie." There wasn't judgment in her tone.

"Yes." Clint rested his head on Natasha's. "It's nice though to have a friend who understands."

The vague ache returned to Natasha's chest. "It is for me too. Thank you."

Clint kissed the top of her head lightly and they laid in silence for a time. "You're a beautiful dancer," he whispered as she fell asleep.