study_in_scarlet | Dancing in the Dark (for farmboyhawk)

"Not going anywhere. Thanks to you, I can't move my legs anyway", Clint chuckled, watching her leave.

He didn't want to get up any more than her, but if she was being a good example, it was up to him to care for the rest of the necessary.

Sighing, he pushed himself off the sofa, amused how very wobbly he still felt on his legs, and got a big towel from the bedroom to quickly wipe the worst mess off the sofa. Then he spread two more blankets there to lie on so it wouldn't be uncomfortable, with what would indeed need a good cleaning sometime in the upcoming days.

By now it had gotten really chilly in the apartment and he was glad to change into a new pair of trousers after quickly cleaning himself up as good as possible with another towel, and a sweater not like the one Natasha wore, with a faded Springsteen tour date list on the backside. Old, comfortable stuff felt just about right now. Dressing up for the job was annoying enough.

Until Natasha returned, he had them some more water and a plate with chocolate covered crackers ready, supposing she could need a little energy just like him.

Natasha practically collapsed onto the toilet when she reached it, all the muscles in her body feeling overworked, and her legs in particular. It wasn’t an entirely bad feeling, not with the memory of why she felt this way still fresh in her mind.

Once she’d finished she took her time washing up, cleaning the oils and both of their fluids from her skin. Toweling off, she took a moment to look at her reflection and smiled at the disheveled image staring back. She had never thought she could feel this way, never thought she could trust someone and love them so much that she was willing to do anything for them, willing to put her own life on the line to protect them. Some days she had her doubts about S.H.I.E.L.D. but she didn’t want to walk away; if it came down to it, though, and she had to choose between her career and Clint there simply wasn’t any question. If he wanted to leave she would follow; she would follow him anywhere, and she knew he would do the same for her.

Shaking herself, she finished up in the bathroom and stole away to his bedroom to rifle through his bureau, coming up with an old pair of sweatpants that she had to roll the waist and cuffs on. Pulling the sleeves of the sweater down over her hands and the hood up over her head (not that she was particularly cold, but it was cozy), she moved back to the living room to find Clint waiting with food and water at the ready.

“You know, we could always move to the bedroom,” she said, noting how he’d actually made to cover the sofa this time. Not that she wasn’t enjoying how close they had to lay to both fit on the couch, nor the smell that still lingered from their recent escapades. Even so she approached and took a seat beside him on the couch, drawing her feet up under her to keep them warm and reaching for the water, taking a few long gulps.

"I think, this thing has become my favorite piece of furniture."

Clint patted the armrest, grinning, and reached for a cracker, relieved that the dampened mood from before had passed. Probably they would talk again about these things, in their holiday maybe, and maybe he should. Natasha had let him inside her life so much... It wasn't fair excluding her from his problems. But right now he wanted to relax with her.

"I could get you a pair of socks, though."
He watched her curl in her feet with an amused grin. Natasha had no problem with being in the cold and often enough mocked his aversion against anything below freezing temperature. But God forbid if her feet were cold. He reached for the blanket again, spreading it over both their legs and couldn't resist reaching out for her to tickle her bare sole.
"Or I'll just keep 'em warm myself. Bet you haven't had a proper massage in months."

Smiling, Natasha shook her head at his reply. “It certainly has some memories attached to it,” she said, setting her glass back on the coffee table and taking a cracker to nibble on.

Yes, they still had some talking to do, but it could wait until he was ready, she didn’t want to overwhelm him. Besides, it would probably be easier once they were away somewhere and could truly relax. She wanted to know what was going on inside his head, but she didn’t want to push; he had never pushed her and she intended to return the favour.

“That’s okay, I’m - hey!” she protested when Clint tried to tickle her foot. Luckily her few ticklish spots were not so obvious, but she still gave him a mock warning look... a look that melted at the mention of a massage.

“A long, hot bath; a foot massage... you’re spoiling me,” Natasha said, bumping her shoulder against his and giving him a quick peck on the cheek. “You better be careful, I might get used to such treatment and start expecting it all the time.”

"No objections. You know, all you have to do is ask, M'lady..."

Clint winked at her, only half mocking. Making Natasha feel good, whether it was with a little chocolate, a long massage or just holding her when she needed it, was one of his favorite things in life, actually. It was her smile that made the everyday work of blood and lies more bearable, and he always liked to find new creative ways to get it from her.

Also, it wasn't like he needed an excuse for wanting to get his hands on her.

"Come, relax, red."

He moved away to the other end of the sofa, reluctantly, and lifted the cover a bit so she could lay down again if she wanted to, with her feet resting on his thighs.

"I promise, I'll try not to tickle."

Natasha rolled her eyes and gave Clint a nudge in the ribs with her elbow. The truth was that she was pretty sure he wasn’t entirely joking, and she wasn’t sure how to feel about that. She knew Clint would do anything for her, and if she wanted to she could walk all over him and he would lay down and take it. It was a bit of an unpleasant thought, and one she pushed away quickly. That wasn’t her anymore, she wouldn’t use him to get what she wanted.

All she needed to take out of this was that he would treat her like a queen, better than anyone else had ever treated her in her life, better than she deserved to be treated.

She pouted at him when he moved away and purposely stayed right where she was. “That sounds really nice...” she conceded, speaking slowly, “but it means you have to be way over there.” Turning to face him she stretched out one leg and poked him in the thigh with her toes. “Besides, you need to get that energy back up.” She emphasized this point by tossing him a cracker.

"Who says, one goes without the other? We'll make this teamwork."

Clint just grinned and caught her foot in a swift movement, playing just a bit with the strength of his arms to tease her. But his fingers on her sensitive skin were gentle, carefully caressing her, with just the lightest bit of pressure in the right places.

"I'll make you purr a little..." His hand wandered further down her ankle, thumb slowly pressing into the sensitive areas of her sole, the steeled muscles that carried so many of her graceful fighting moves.
"...and you help me out with the crackers." He opened his mouth playfully and leaned his head back, determined to make her laugh with his little bird imitation.

Natasha made a very half-hearted attempt to pull her foot away before heaving a mock sigh in defeat. It was all worth it to see him smile like that.

Her eyelids dropped until she was looking at him through her lashes when he started pressing and caressing her feet, and if she had been inclined to refuse she certainly lost all will to do so now. He was just far too good with his hands, no matter what the application.

“You’re lucky you’re not the only one with good aim,” Natasha replied with a light laugh. Taking up the plate of crackers she tossed one toward Clint’s open mouth before popping one into her own.

Clint caught the cracker between his lips with ease and peered at Natasha from the corner of his eyes, enjoying every single second of her laugh. It had been long since he had heard that sound so often on one weekend.

"I have full trust in your skills", he answered, grinning, before he went back to his job at hand, with pleasure.

He knew Natasha's body pretty well, of course, but they had never taken much time for tenderness, for slow, thorough touching and exploring, and he quickly found himself addicted to it. That he couldn't quite see what he was doing with the blanket covering them just helped it.
He was feeling every inch of her soft skin under his hands, every ripple of strong muscles against the shifting pressure of his thumbs and and palms, the delicately defined outline of her bones.
Right there, that was that little uneven spot he knew, where she had had her metatarsal bone crushed once. The sound of the bones of the guy who had been responsible, breaking under Clint's fist, still was a very pleasuring memory. Around this area, Natasha's muscles felt especially tense from too much constant adjustment.
He worked them gently, with just his fingertips, his eyes half closed to feel every twitch, hear every of her breath, to make sure he wasn't hurting her.

Soon he actually found himself relaxing from their adventure and the heavy talk afterwards, melting back against the back rest with his head leaned back and a quiet toneless hum on his lips.

“Mm, speaking of skills...” she purred playfully in reply. She unconsciously flinched when he touched that old injury but soon relaxed again at his gentle caresses, letting out a slow breath.

Tossing Clint another cracker, Natasha set the plate aside and laid back again across the sofa, a content sigh escaping her lips. This whole day had been filled with so many different types of intimacies, so many of them simple to most people but new to Natasha, and at the moment she was having a hard time recalling she had avoided them for so long.

She was happy. Completely content and unquestionably happy, and she owed so much of it to Clint. Propping her head up on the arm of the sofa, she watched him through half lidded eyes, the faintest, softest smile on her lips.

"Well, you still don't know half the things I can do with my hands."
Clint raised his chin a little with feigned pride but couldn't keep a straight face for long. He rather busied himself with pulling Natasha's other leg onto his lap too, so she could comfortably stretch out.

And there it was again, that smile he wanted to drown in. In a way it was even more beautiful than just joking around and making her laugh, and so much more honest and intimate than the polite expression she had in store for strangers.

He watched her closely from the corner of his eyes while he caressed and massaged her, with the same care on every movement he needed when handling a charge or a filigree weapon. And if maybe one of his hands softly caressed her shin from time to time or flickered over her knee, it was just to add to her relaxation.

“Is that so?” Natasha replied, chuckling at his antics. “Well then I very much look forward to finding out.”

They would have plenty of opportunity to explore this, explore everything, when they were away on vacation, just the two of them. It would be a revelation, she could already tell, and the thought was both exciting and a bit frightening. They both had secrets, both had things they had difficulty talking about and sharing with other people, but maybe it was time to let some of those go. Natasha wasn’t sure she could ever be truly honest about everything in her past; some of it she didn’t want to think about let alone discuss, and there were other things even she wasn’t sure she remembered correctly. There were transgressions in her past that even she wasn’t aware of, but of those she knew she could at least try to be honest; she couldn’t expect Clint to be the only one to open up.

There were so many intimacies they could explore if they only had the time to do so.

For a long while they were silent, and while Natasha could feel Clint watching her she let her own eyes drift closed though that soft smile remained. She didn’t sleep, but she was somewhere damn close to it, her entire body relaxed and even her mind mostly at ease. She tried not to think of anything, to just focus on his touch. It turned out to be a rather easy task.

Though Clint still wasn't in a mood to get up, get out from this most comfortable, private situation... When Natasha seemed to drift into a light kind of sleep after all, he decided to make use of the few minutes for necessary duties.

Very carefully, to not disturb her, he squirmed out from under her and pulled the blanket all over her body. He leaned down for a soft kiss on her forehead to let her know he wasn't going anywhere far and quickly scurried over to the door and downstairs.

The air in the stairway was uncomfortably chilly and he cursed himself for not having brought a jacket, but at least the generator in the cellar had mercy with him. It came back to life after two newly adjusted screws and a hard hit on the roof. It wouldn't last forever but it would do for a while.

When he went back upstairs, he was trembling and was quick to close the door behind him, hoping the radiators would soon come back to life.

He didn't want to go back to touching Natasha with cold hands and stayed at the window for a few long moments, lights still out because that candle thing was actually kind of comforting. He counted the number of other lights the storm had taken out in the neighborhood.

A few fires were burning in the distance, and the sensitive sensors of his hearing aids caught horns on the street. Good thing it was still raining.

He hadn't realized how tired he had really grown of this look outside, into the crazy killing mess his hometown had become, until he heard himself sigh, felt his hands resting heavily on the window sill. It would have been easy thinking these were just fire service horns down there. Scum always came out at night, especially when the lights were out.
And many people were much more afraid, especially afraid to ask for help from the authorities, since the battle of New York.

Nearly a year, and really nothing had gotten much better.

Natasha felt him move, and while it was tempting to pin him down and prevent him from getting up, she figured he would only move if necessary and feigned sleep instead. The corners of her lips curled up a little more at the kiss and she curled up on her side, snuggling into the blanket to await his return. She was surprised when it wasn’t the bathroom door she heard but the front door. Rolling over to look at it with a furrowed brow, after a moment she settled back down to wait.

Minutes passed, but it wasn’t long before she heard the door open again and the soft click of the latch when Clint closed it behind him as quietly as possible. Closing her eyes again, she waited to feel the sofa move when he reclaimed his seat but she heard him move across the room instead and cracked her lids open just enough to see him. When she saw his back was to her, his form silhouetted in the window, she opened her eyes fully to study him. He was clearly cold, that much was obvious, but it was the heavy set of his shoulders and the soft sigh that hit her right in the heart. As much as they tried to keep everything fun and light it was clear he was carrying around a lot of darkness in his soul, and he needed more than just distractions and cheeriness.

Getting silently to her feet, Natasha draped the blanket around her shoulders and quietly approached Clint, not stopping until she could wrap her arms around him from behind, blanket and all. She didn’t say anything, not wanting to either brush off what he might be feeling nor push him if he wasn’t ready, instead just pressing her face against his back, placing a kiss there even through the thick sweater, and holding him tightly.

He saw her get up in the reflection and tried to show her a smile, show her it was okay. And it was, sort of. He had been worse, right... after. But things weren't still fully alright and not letting her know that would be simply unfair. For her, he didn't need to make a happy face all the time.

He pulled the sleeves over his sweater over his hands to not shock freeze her before he placed them on her arms, gently, thankfully caressing over them and leaning into her touch.
"I used to like it here", he sighed, feeling he owned her an explanation, even if it was just melancholy coming up at the worst point of time. "It's high and far from the fancy places. Calm. Now it seems, no fucking roof in this hole city can be high enough to escape all this bullshit. It's everywhere I turn."

She knew how much he had once loves this place, how he had been almost proud to call it his, this little piece of the city where he was just Clint, where he could take people in and help them out. It hurt to hear him sounding so disillusioned about it now, about everything.

“After everything we saw and everything we went through, it’s hard to just go back to normal,” she said, turning her head to the side so her cheek lay against his back and she could hold him even closer. They had fought aliens, Clint had been brainwashed by a god, and now they were just supposed to live their lives like before? It was hard enough to see the beauty in the world when they only had the one to worry about, but now that there were multiple worlds...

“It’s not everywhere...” she said softly.

"Good thing, we don't do too normal anyway, huh?"

With a deep sigh, Clint turned away from the window to lock out these useless heavy thoughts and put his arms around Natasha instead which evidently helped much better. She was warm and life against this freezing body, touching him like a good part of all that destruction out there wouldn't be his fault, and he knew, without her by his side, he wouldn't be standing here now. She had become his anchor in a time when even standing up in the morning had felt like a unbearable burden. If he'd already loved her before, the last year had only steeled this deep emotional foundation.

He shouldn't be thanking her in letting himself drown in useless melancholy, the moment she wasn't looking.

"Didn't want to wake you", he murmured into her hair, fingertips gently caressing up and down her back. "Wanna get some rest?"

When Clint turned to face her Natasha kept her arms around him, the blanket surrounding them both. Even through her sweater she could feel how cold his hands were and made sure to shift the blanket up further around him.

“It’s okay, I wasn’t really asleep,” she replied. She wanted him to know he could talk to her, that he had every right to these moods and that he didn’t have to deal with them alone, but she couldn’t quite find the words to say that. She was used to manipulating people for information, or interrogating. To simply offer an ear should he need it sounded simple but it was harder than either of these other methods.

“Mm, we probably should. You wore me out,” she said with a smile in her voice. “And you need some warming up.”

"Hm-hm. Don't wait for an apology for that."
He grinned, but he made sure to lean down for a quick kiss, showing her how thankful he was to have her around especially in such moments of weakness, to ground him, tear his mind away from the dark places.

"Just need one or two human minutes. Make yourself comfortable."
He pointed shortly at the bedroom door and left for the bathroom after another tender kiss on her hair.

He felt a little fresher, clearer after cleaning up better than he had it done before, when Natasha had been in the bathroom. His eyes were caught by several certain marks from their game before on his skin, and now smiling was easier. There would be evenings for bad memories again, but this wasn't one of them.

Though the heaters had finally started to work again, he wrapped himself back in the track pants and his sweater before he went to the bedroom. Natasha would probably laughing at him, and with good reason, but he just always needed a while longer for his body temperature to regulate, when he had just been freezing his balls off.

He was quiet, in case she was already asleep and stopped for a moment at the door, with still that half of a smile on his lips.

She hadn’t meant to distract him from his troubles, hadn’t intended to lighten the mood this time. She wanted him to know that she was there if he wanted to talk, and the last thing she wanted was for him to think she wanted him to put on a happy face. She hoped he knew, she hoped he didn’t feel that he always had to change the subject. She wanted to be there for him in any way he needed, but she didn’t know how to express that. This was all still just far too new to her.

When Clint disappeared into the washroom, Natasha blew out the candle and picked her way easily through the dark to the bedroom. Shedding her clothes she folded them and set them aside before crawling into bed and pulling the covers right up to her chin. The sheets were rough, she was sure Clint had never heard of fabric softener, but she liked the roughness against her skin, there was something comforting about it that she wouldn’t change for the world.

She heard him moving about, no matter how quiet he tried to be, and when he seemed content to linger in the doorway she raised her head to look at him, enjoying the partial smile he wore. “You better get in here before you freeze,” she said, keeping herself, and her state of undress, fully covered.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. I'm a wuss. It's a sign of getting old, I guess. It's gotten worse with time."

More relieved than he liked to admit, Clint fled from the still chilly air under the covers with her, but didn't reach out for her, not yet, not before his hands had warmed up. It was pretty much since he had spent a full year in the middle of the desert that he took low temperatures even worse than before. P.E.G.A.S.U.S. had left a mark in more than one way.

He ignored the humorless little chuckle inside his head, telling him, he knew exactly that it wasn't the sudden withdrawal from the Mojave dune right into the middle of bloody mess in New York, that had taken its toll. It was not this waking him up in the middle of the night, trembling all over his body.

He had already decided he didn't want to mope any more tonight. And certainly not about details of his captivity that had not even made it into the medical file.

He preferred to look at Natasha to channel his thoughts into a better direction, burying both his hands under the pillow for now to get rid of the last effects of useless mind games.

“Perhaps,” Natasha said, watching him settle in on the other side of the bed. “But you’re still pretty spry for an old man.”

Rolling onto her side to face him, she tucked her hands under her own pillow a moment, mimicking his position as she searched his face. She knew he had never really liked the cold, he always complained when they got sent somewhere snowy, preferring more tropical destinations, but it had gotten worse, but then his tolerance for a lot of things had gone downhill as clearly evidenced by his feelings about the home he used to love.

She was pretty sure she could see in his eyes that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore, but the heavy stuff kept coming up tonight, so maybe it wasn’t a matter of ‘want’ so much as ‘need’.

“Whenever you’re ready to talk, about anything, I’m here,” she offered simply, her voice soft and sincere.

"As long as I still win every single wheelchait race against the other Sunday afternoon chess guys..."

The smile had a hard time staying on his lips. Now that Natasha had started mentioning it, it became even harder clearing his mind from stuff that he didn't want there anymore.

"It's okay."

He reached out for her hand under her pillow, holding it right there to keep them both warm. Still there was no way to prevent that hard shudder down his back, when he tried to drop this as quick and clean as possible.

"I've promised myself that this poor excuse of a tin God isn't worth even thinking about him. He won't have that triumph."

His hand was cold but she didn’t mind, she just squeezed it back.

“If only it was that easy,” she said. How many things had she promised herself weren’t worth thinking about since she couldn’t change them? How often did that keep her from thinking about them anyway? But she had said her piece, he knew that she was there for him when he needed her, that he could talk to her whenever he wanted, that she wanted him to open up to her whenever he was ready, and that was enough. “There’s no expiry date on that offer. Just keep it in mind.” If not tonight then maybe tomorrow, or next week, or month, or year. It didn’t matter; whenever he was ready then so was she.

“You did such a good job of warming me up earlier...” Shifting closer to him, she wound one arm around his back. “So now it’s my turn.” She would be content to just hold him through the rest of the night, to share her body heat and ward off the cold and the nightmares that only made it worse.

He could have answered with another witty remark but preferred to just pull her close, one hand still under the pillow, the other softly caught in her hair. It was worst in his hands and he didn't want her to freeze more than necessary.

The softness of her body close to his helped shut his eyes, breathe slowly through the quickest, easiest of meditation. To channel his thought on this one positive anchor inside, the way he had learned it from his first supervising officer back then.

In this case it was Natasha's beloved clear scent engulfing him, along with her warmth, the associations of their passionate game before tied to it until his body responded with the weak memory of arousal. Just a little quickening of his pulse really, and a deep, content sigh.

It was simply physically impossible to think of any torture bullshit with his partner's body pressed close to his.

"Maybe I should just start calling you every time this happens", he murmured, hand just softly tightening in her hair to caress the sensitive skin of her neck.

Dancing in the Dark (for farmboyhawk)

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