... in which Tony finds out a bit more about Clint's childhood than he wanted to know, meaning: kinda nasty stuff. Consider yourselves warned.

Couch Talk

"What did I tell you?"

The question came so suddenly that it caught Tony totally off guard.

He and Barton were lounging in the living area after lunch. They had the upper levels of Avengers Tower all to themselves. The others had been sent up north on some mission. Tony hadn't quite paid attention to the briefing because he wasn't included. Barton was still grounded after their latest adventure and would be for another two weeks at least. They couldn't ground Tony since he wasn't part of SHIELD but he had been advised to take it slowly for a while and he had decided it was a good idea to do so. A few days off weren't bad. Would have been better if Pepper had been there, too, but she had stuff to do in L.A.

So it was just him and Barton.

Who was still looking at him and waiting for an answer.

"Uh – when?"
Tony rubbed the back of his neck and pretended he didn't know what the archer was talking about.

Barton frowned at him.
"You know when, Stark."

"Oh, then. Nothing. You told me nothing."
Tony gave him a wide-eyed look of innocence. Of course, it didn't work. Should have known that. It never did.

Barton rolled his eyes.
"I know I talked, Stark. Probably a lot. That's how those drugs work. I could fight it for a while, but after you came to the rescue and there was no need anymore to keep my mouth shut –"

Tony was about to ask why, when he obviously didn't remember, he wanted to know what he had said. But then, Barton looked at him and he could see in the archer's eyes that he needed to know. He needed to know how vulnerable he had shown himself. Tony understood that. He would have felt the same.

"Well."
He cleared his throat. This wasn't awkward at all, oh no.
"You – really didn't talk all that much cos you fell asleep pretty quick."

And he had done his best to shut Barton up once he had realized what the man was rambling on about and where he was headed.

"You told me a little about the bible-nuts", he said. "'Onward, Christian Soldiers' and so on."

"Ah."
Barton nodded.
"Alabama. Not exactly the best time in my life."

"You might have mentioned some quite – creative ways of punishing you", Tony went on.

"Yeah. Being made to kneel on dried peas for hours, reciting 'Our Lord's Prayer'. Or soap bars in pillow cases."

"Ouch." Tony winced. "You didn't mention those."

Barton shrugged. He shifted a bit on the couch.
"Nothing like a good Christian who's trying to put the fear of god into you. They figured out pretty fast that I was 'unmanageable', as they put it", he said. "So I went to the next family."

"Well, I sure hope it got better there", Tony said.

Barton shook his head.
"Not really. They looked okay at first but it turned out the father liked his drink a little too much."
He didn't quite meet Tony's eyes.
"And he had a thing for little boys. Never got me, though."
Now he did look at Tony with a grim smile on his lips and an almost savage gleam in his eyes.
"He tried to make me suck his cock, one night. I bit him so hard I almost bit it off."

"Jesus!" Tony tried not to stare at him but knew he wasn't succeeding. "Didn't they ever put you up with normal folks?"

Barton grew serious again.
"Carol and Ed. The last family. They were decent folks. Couldn't have any kids of their own, or so they thought. They seemed to like me and maybe, they even would have kept me."

"What happened?" Tony asked.

"Carol got pregnant. And since I knew they wouldn't want me anymore once the baby was born, little smartass that I was –"
Again, Barton shrugged.

Tony nodded.
"I see. Next stop: circus."

"Yup."

And that hadn't worked out, either. Of course, Tony was curious to hear what had gone wrong there but for the time being, he decided he'd asked enough questions. He was surprised, actually, the archer had told him as much as he had.

Barton was staring at the couch Tony had settled down on but he could tell the man wasn't really seeing it.
"The funny thing is – ten years later, I'm just having breakfast and suddenly, I see that photo on the milk carton. Me, as a kid. Almost choked. Obviously, they were trying to find me."

"Hm."
Tony didn't know what to say without sounding like he was either pitying or patronizing the man. That certainly wasn't what the guy wanted to hear. And he didn't want to risk being murdered in his sleep, either. Okay, so Barton still might do that, once he decided he'd told Tony too much.

He settled for an age-old, well-known truth.
"Life sucks."

"Yeah." Barton snorted. "Big time."
He glanced up at Tony. There was a small smile on his face.
"Not so much since I joined SHIELD, though."

Tony returned the smile.

"Hey, wanna watch a movie?" he asked.

"Sure, why not? What you got?"

Tony cocked his head to the side and considered this. He had a large collection of movies available on DVD. He just wasn't sure which ones Barton would enjoy as much as he.

"How about –"
He stopped and grinned. The ultimate test. If Barton was as much of a freak as he seemed, he'd love that movie.
"How about we take a trip to the Grid?"

"What?"
Barton sat up straighter and winced when his injured side obviously didn't like that.
"That one's out on DVD?"

"You know it."
Tony's grin grew broader.

"Of course I know it! I saw it at the theater when it first came out."
Barton shook his head.
"Gods, that was ages ago."

Tony got up to get the DVD. Halfway to the TV, he stopped and turned.

"So – I've always been a computer nerd and thus, of course, I know it", he said. "What's your excuse?"

Barton grinned back at him.
"Arcade games."

"I see."

Three weeks later when they were back in action and fighting a new villain and his troops, Clint sputtered and almost missed his aim when he heard Tony call at him over his earpiece: "Blast 'em a good one, Pinball Wizkid!"