"So, your brother really is the Barton that Thor mentioned back on your first day?" Natasha asked after several seconds of silence. Clint nodded. "Why didn't you just tell us?"

"Because I don't enjoy talking about my family. Especially not around someone like Steve who would probably end up giving me sympathy stares...or something." Clint mumbled.

"Maybe. But if you told him to stop, he would." Before Clint could speak, she continued. "Now. About that family thing. Why exactly are you staying with Steve?"

"Because I don't exactly have anywhere else to go?" Clint tried. Natasha raised an eyebrow.

"Spill Barton."

And spill he did. He told her all about what happened with his family, what happened with the foster homes he stayed at, everything. He found that, despite them both being reserved, he could really talk to Natasha Romanoff.

A few minutes after he finished, after a terrible silence that made Clint Barton squirm in his place against the wall, Natasha spoke. "I'm glad you told someone."

"Why's that?" Clint asked.

"Because, no matter how reserved I am, even I know that talking can help with problems." The red head was staring right in Clints eyes. He found her eyes to be a rather beautiful shade of green.

"Oh? Then why don't you tell me of your issues, Miss Romanoff?" He raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest as he spoke. Natasha stared at him like he was an idiot. "C'mon. A fair trade. I tell you my life story, you tell me yours."

"Why would I do that when you chose to tell me?" Clint rolled his eyes.

"I don't know, maybe because I know for a fact something happened to make you the way you are? Because I know that you have your own problems and- just like you said- it helps to tell someone."

"And why would I tell you?" Natasha raised her deathly eyebrow at him. He fought the urge to raise one back.

"Because who better for a reserved person to talk to than someone who's just as reserved as them?" Clint smiled at his friend. Not a smirk, but an honest to god smile.

She let out a puff of air. He could tell he won this battle. "Alright." They spent the next half hour discussing Natashas life. How her parents would ignore her or they would focus solely on using her for their fame. Apparently, her dancing was so skilled for such a young girl, that Mr. and Mrs. Romanova made thousands off of their daughters dance recitels. When she turned 8 and found she had an aunt in America willing to have her live there, Natasha jumped at the chance. Unfortunately, her maids lessons of 'manners' (basically, don't show emotion of any type and always be polite even if you hate the person) never wore off. Natasha grew to find she enjoyed being left alone and perfected her now normal mask.

Clint would comment here or there, or would wait patiently and silently while his friend drifted off into a memory.

"So, here I am today." Natasha finished. Clint watched her a moment.

"See, now don't you feel better?" Clint smirked at her when she gave a hesitant nod.

"Don't get cocky, hotsauce."

"Wouldn't dream of it, Nat." Clints smirk got eviller as Natasha froze at the nickname.

"Nat?" She said, not looking at him. "You're going to start calling me 'Nat' all the time now, aren't you?"

"So long as you don't stop me." He answered truthfully. "Maybe I'll even throw in a 'Tash' or a 'Tasha' every now and then." Clint stood up from where he'd been sitting on the floor and walked over to the firey red head. "And in return you can call me Barton, Hot sauce, or, more preferably, Clint." He stuck his hand out. "Deal?"

Natasha stared at his hand a moment. Eventually, a slow smile crossed her face. She shook his hand as she looked at him. "Deal."

Clint smiled back.


Author's Note: Okay. Sorry for the short chapter. But I need to tell you that I lied. This story will most likely keep being updated at a fast pace. I'm hoping that's somewhat good news to you people, but I got bad news too. This story has a couple more chapters, but I'm almost 95% certain that it's close to done. I have more written on my laptop than this and what I have seems to be like a good ending. I'm not sure how to close it yet, so the ending might not be for a little bit. But this is a forewarning. I hope you enjoy the ending, because I had fun writing it.

Ja ne.