hoosierbitch (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
hoosierbitch) wrote2013-05-26 11:00 am
hoosierbitch) wrote2013-05-26 11:00 am
Entry tags:
Fic: Alright is Two Different Words [Clint/Coulson, Dyslexia!Verse, part 4/4. WOO!]
Title: Alright is Two Different Words [4/4]
Author:hoosierbitch
Series: Dyslexia!Verse
Rating: R
Notes: The first part of this series is As It Is Written. The second part was written by the amazingarsenicjade. You can find the whole thing via my LJ dyslexia!verse tag, or on AO3.)
Content Advisory: References to child abuse and neglect. If you need more information, please contact me, I’m happy to help.
Thanks:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ivorysilk improved this chapter immeasurably. Best beta ever.
Summary: Third dates, elbows in the appropriate place, and laughter.
Coulson kisses him again before he drops Clint off at SHIELD headquarters. (As second dates go (especially considering the non-event that their first date had been), Clint’s putting this in the win column.) Lola’s gear-shift digs into his stomach and Coulson puts his hand on the side of Clint’s head and it feels perfect.
But once he gets out of the car he feels unsafe. He feels like gravity’s failed and his body’s coming apart from the ground under his feet. It’s new, and terrifying, and he blames it all on Coulson.
He wants to call Coulson back.
He doesn’t call.
They’ve planned their next date for a week from today. Coulson said he was going to make dinner in his apartment and asked Clint to bring the wine. (He didn’t ask if Clint could manage it, if he knew where to go or what to bring, if he had enough money. Clint likes that Coulson trusts him.)
When he gets to his room he tucks the movie tickets into Trick Shot’s book.
His dreams taste like popcorn and Sprite, but they still smell like gunpowder.
*
It’s not often that Coulson gets sent on long-distance jobs off-comm, much less month-long ops without even being allowed to say goodbye. It’s the longest they’ve been out of contact since Clint started at SHIELD. And whatever this mission is, the details are locked down tight. No matter how much digging Clint does, he can’t find any info about where Coulson’s gone or what he’s doing. Hill humors his pestering at first, but eventually she bans him from Command and tells him to chill the fuck out.
Sitwell sends him on some easy gigs to keep him from getting underfoot. They’re mostly surveillance jobs. Clint would have enjoyed the impromptu vacations if he wasn’t so worried about Coulson (and if he didn’t have so much maneuvering to do to hide his unfiled paperwork. He’s out of practice, and Sitwell’s no slouch).
Hill’s the one who calls him when Coulson comes back, so he forgives her for withholding information earlier on. Because Coulson is…
Coulson’s sick when he comes back. Not Medical-sick, not body-sick. The doctors check him over and don’t protest when Hill tells Clint to sign him out. Coulson says thanks (the last thing he says that night) and lets Clint and Maria walk him down to the parking garage. He hands Clint the keys when Clint asks for them and doesn’t seem to notice that Clint’s planning on driving his car. Hill, on the other hand, is as shocked as Clint.
He reminds Coulson to put on his seatbelt and he complies. When they get to Coulson’s apartment, Clint parks, turns the car off, opens Coulson’s door for him, undoes the man’s seatbelt, and pulls him out. Coulson sags against the hood and Clint locks everything up before hoisting Coulson’s arm over his shoulder and carrying the man inside.
Clint’s dealt with shock victims before, but never like this. It’s never been someone he loved. He feels helpless, useless in a way he almost never lets himself feel.
He opens the door to the apartment with the key Phil gave him when they started doing dinner regularly. It’s strange to find it dark and not already filled with the smell of Coulson’s cooking. He thinks that it’s a good thing Coulson doesn’t keep plants at home. Clint’s been watering the ones in his office, but it hadn’t seemed right to come here alone.
Coulson lets Clint take him into the bedroom without complaining. Almost without noticing. Clint leans him against the wall, since Coulson doesn’t seem capable of standing on his own anymore, and strips Coulson out of his suit piece by piece. His tie is perfectly done and his shirt’s tucked in. Coulson had obviously waited to fall apart until the last possible minute.
Clint gets him out of his shoes, slacks, jacket, and shirt, and starts to shift him over to the bed. Coulson, for the first time since he got back, reaches out for Clint. Wraps his arms around him and holds on so tight it hurts. There aren’t any bruises on Coulson’s body, no wounds that Clint can see; Medical wouldn’t have let him go if he’d actually been injured, but Clint still wishes for a physical hurt that he could help to heal.
Instead he just holds Coulson while he cries. As far as he can tell, with Coulson’s face pressed up against his chest, there are no tears. Coulson’s body shudders and hoarse cries crawl their way up from somewhere inside of him that Clint hadn’t known existed. Clint holds him, holds him up, holds him until he thinks they’ll both evaporate; Clint’s useless half-formed words (they’re lies, but they’re all he has: it’ll be okay, you’re okay, and, when those are gone, I’ve got you) and Coulson’s nonexistent tears.
When Coulson quiets down Clint tucks him into bed. He leaves Coulson there while he double-checks that all the doors and windows are locked and the alarm system is set, and then he curls up on top of Coulson’s covers, between Coulson and the door, on guard. Coulson eventually falls asleep, but Clint keeps watch like a dream-catcher, ready to wake him at the slightest sign of a nightmare.
*
Coulson’s talking in complete sentences again (dry, sarcastic, almost-believably-normal sentences) and Clint’s in the cafeteria to grab snacks because he’s almost caught up on his paperwork and deserves a cookie or five when he hears someone call Coulson a fag.
Clint, who’s been dreading this since before their first date, turns around and looks the other man up and down. He’s large and blond and eating an apple at the corner table, talking to a couple of other guys. He must be new.
“I think I misheard you,” Clint says, walking over and interrupting the table’s ongoing conversation. His pockets are full of granola bars to restock some of his hideaways, but he’s got Coulson’s favorite crappy dessert treats in his hands. “What’s that you were saying about Agent Coulson?”
When the other man calls Coulson a fag again, Clint drops the desserts and launches himself across the table. It’s been a while since he was in a good old-fashioned brawl, and it’s fun while it lasts. He gets in enough hits to feel placated when the other agents finally separate them. He manages to pocket a package of Twinkies that miraculously hadn’t gotten squished before Sitwell pins his arms and frog-marches him out of the room.
The other guy is still on the ground. There’s blood on Clint’s sleeve, splattering the SHIELD insignia. There are agents he recognizes standing around looking worried, and someone’s called for medical.
Clint feels only a vicious satisfaction.
*
It’s pretty clear from the video surveillance who started the fight. Clint analyzes his form, makes a note to practice his left uppercut (he’d left himself wide open, it’s embarrassing) and smiles at the blonde woman across the table in the interrogation room. “Sorry, what was the question?”
“Why did you attack Security Specialist Franklin?”
“Felt like it.”
“Agent Barton, I feel I should remind you of the severity of your situation. You’re looking at a minimum of three months’ suspension for physically assaulting another agent. There’s footage of the attack, a room full of trained witnesses, Franklin’s word that he did nothing to provoke you, and your…somewhat less than adequate explanation.”
Clint shifts in his seat. He hasn’t spent that much time in lock-up, but the times he had weren’t exactly pleasant. (He’s having flashbacks of being thirteen and scared and lonely for his brother.)
“I’m pretty sure nothing I say is going to make up for punching…what his name…in the face, so what’s the use?”
The woman leans forward, her elbows on Clint’s spread-open personnel folder, and tells him, in a voice that suggests that if it mattered to him, then it’ll matter to her.
Clint doesn’t believe her for a second. “Can I talk to Coulson before I talk to you?”
“No. I don’t want you changing your story.” Her tone remains sympathetic. Clint tries not to glare at her, because he knows she’s just doing her job.
He really wants Coulson.
He makes himself take a deep breath and thinks of Coulson saying his name, quiet and calm. Holds onto the memory for a long beat. The silence stretches a moment too long.
“SHIELD’s got rules about discrimination, right?”
She leans back and nods at him. Her expression hasn’t changed at all.
“That include name-calling?”
“It depends. What did he call you?”
Franklin had been talking about Coulson, not Clint, but it makes it easier to be honest if he can at least lie about that. “Fag.”
He feels uncomfortable saying the word now. It feels like years, like a lifetime since he’d spit the word at Coulson. It still feels like yesterday when he’d realized that the word was a weapon, and that he’d hurt Coulson with it.
Franklin, Clint’s willing to bet, had probably known exactly what damage that word could inflict.
“Did you have any interactions with Security Specialist Franklin before he called you a fag?”
“You mean did I grab his dick or something?”
“No. I meant, is there any reason that you know of why Franklin would have a grudge against you? Why he’d want to hurt you, or get you in trouble?”
“I honestly don’t know.” He really didn’t. Coulson’s one of the kindest men Clint’s ever known, even if he does try to keep his heart under wraps, and Clint’s never even seen Franklin before that afternoon.
She nods and looks down at her papers. Clint really hopes she’s not going to make him fill anything out. “Hang tight,” she says. “I’ll be back soon.” Her eyes, Clint notes, look different now. The sympathy in them seems a fraction more genuine. Clint reminds himself not to hope.
She takes her folder with her so he just stares at the table and counts the seconds in his head. Coulson had told him once that it freaked people out when Clint went still. He hopes he gives whoever’s watching the surveillance feed of his room nightmares.
After about two hours, she comes back in. “Two witnesses have confirmed your story. On behalf of internal investigations, I apologize for Security Specialist Franklin’s conduct. You can be assured that he will be appropriately reprimanded. You, however, will be on one week’s unpaid suspension, and when you return, you will attend mandatory anger-management courses. Physical violence isn’t the right way to respond to every attack, Special Agent.”
“Just most of them.”
“In your line of work? Probably.” Her eyes are green, Clint notes, and tired.
She holds the door open for him, but he doesn’t feel like he can leave yet. “I know he’s probably just an asshole,” Clint says, “but maybe Franklin just didn’t know any better.”
“He’ll be taking a sensitivity training course,” she says, her eyes softening for the first time as she looks at him. “If that’s the reason, we’ll take care of it.”
“And if he’s just an asshole, I’ll keep punching him.”
She sighs, but almost fondly; it reminds him of his mom. “I hope I never have to see you again. Good luck, Special Agent. Thank you for your time.”
“Whatever.” He waves a hand over his shoulder and books it to his room. All his stuff’s still there.
Coulson stops by pretty soon after that and explains to Clint that one week’s suspension doesn’t mean that he has to leave the base. He can stay in his apartment. “Or you can stay in mine,” Phil says, shrugging and not making eye contact. “You’ve got the whole week off, you might as well relax a little. Watch some TV.”
“Maybe make you dinner,” Clint muses, thinking about what he might be able to make without risking burning down Coulson’s nice kitchen.
“That would…that would be nice,” Coulson says. “I, uh—I hear you defended my honor today.”
Clint shrugs. He doesn’t know who had sussed out the actual details of the situation, but it’s almost reassuring that Coulson still knows everything. When Coulson backs him up against the wall and kisses him, Clint goes easily. When Coulson finally lets him up for air, Clint gives him his slightly-squished Twinkies.
Coulson says thanks, and not just for the Twinkies. Clint twists them around and kisses Phil until his lips are swollen, his eyelids lowered lazily.
(He does set fire to Coulson’s kitchen, but only once, and only for a little bit. Coulson’s mostly just angry that Clint shot all the fire alarms.
Coulson, Clint discovers, is even hotter when he’s angry.)
*
There’s paperwork waiting for Clint the next morning. “Declaration of romantic intention,” he sounds out. “Declaration of—wait, what?”
“It’s a form,” Phil says, “alerting SHIELD as to the altered nature of our relationship.”
“There’s paperwork for this shit? And you want to fill it out? Wait, what am I saying, of course there is, and of course you do. No.” Clint tries to look firm, and not like he’s sulking.
Or scared.
“All you have to do is sign.”
“No.”
“This doesn’t change anything,” Coulson says. “It just protects us in case something—like yesterday—goes wrong.”
“Who’s going to know? Who gets to read this?”
“Fury. Hill. Probably Sitwell. And anyone with clearance levels higher than ten.”
“Mine’s only nine.”
“Then you should feel lucky I’m letting you take a look at these papers. They’re classified, you know.” Coulson’s eyes are knowing as he looks at Clint. Clint avoids his gaze.
He takes the forms back to his apartment and tries to read them. Two days later he brings them back, asks Phil if signing them is really the best thing to do, and writes his name down when Phil says Yes.
*
“Fury wants to see me.”
“Oh.”
“Fury’s going to kill me.”
“Fury is not going to…Fury is probably not going to—”
“I am never coming to you for reassurances ever again. I am never signing anything you give me ever again. I am never—”
“If your meeting’s at two, you better run.”
Clint swears, kisses Phil for good luck (apparently good-luck-kissing is one of the normal things Clint didn’t know about, a Midwestern ritual or something; Phil insists on it whenever they have the chance), and heads to Fury’s office.
*
“Phil is one of my oldest friends,” Fury says. He’s holding Phil’s paperwork—Clint’s signature at the bottom, lopsided as always—in his hands.
Clint tries to dig his way out of his chair using his shoulder blades. If he presses against it hard enough, it’ll have to work eventually, right? “I know. I promise, I’m not going to hurt him. I’m not fucking with him, I—”
“Phil is one of my oldest friends, but—and this is very important for you to hear, Barton, so listen closely—that is not as important as the fact that he is your superior officer. If you ever, ever, feel that he is abusing his power, or that you are being taken advantage of, or if there’s anything you need that you feel uncomfortable asking for from Phil, I want you to come to me or Hill. You’re an important asset to SHIELD, and your health and safety, both on and off the job, is paramount. Do you understand?”
Clint’s pretty sure that he understands, he’s just not sure if he believes. “Are you serious?”
“I don’t joke, Barton. Now get the fuck out of my office.”
“Right. Okay. Uh—thank you, sir.”
“You’re welcome. Now leave and shut the door behind you.”
When he tells Phil about it, he laughs, and then smiles, and then bakes Fury a muffin basket.
*
Clint fucking hates Russia.
“Hold on,” he says, keeping his gun trained on his target, straining to keep an eye on every possible movement that her body might make. She’s many different kinds of threat, and Clint’s down to his last precious reserves of energy. He’s tired, hungry, worn down to the bone. The knife-wounds scattered along his forearms and hands where he’d fended off her attacks have stopped hurting because most of him has gone numb. “This whole thing would be a whole lot easier for me if I just shot you, so please—please just give me a minute so I don’t have to do that.”
She shifts her weight, relaxing against the wall where Clint’s cornered her. He wants to laugh with how little he believes her tell.
Clint thinks. There’s something here; something off-pattern. Something sideways that he can’t quite put his finger on.
He shifts his weight and she responds in kind; ready to move if he moves. “You remind me of somebody,” Clint says.
“If you’re about to say that I remind of your girlfriend, I will rip off your tiny dick and feed it to you.” Her voice is flat.
Yeah. The resemblance is definitely there. Clint opens his mouth and shoots her in the split second of waiting-to-listen that people habitually give to someone about to talk. Clint, who’s stumbled unexpectedly into that moment too many times not to learn how to take advantage of it, strips off his coat and presses it against the gunshot wound in her gut, covering the red blossoming on her dark blue gown before it has a chance to spread.
She gasps and presses a knife that Clint hadn’t known she was carrying up against his jugular.
“Help me get out of here or I’ll kill you,” she says, her hand not wavering.
“You remind me of my brother,” Clint says conversationally, pressing the coat tighter to stop the flow of blood and trying not to swallow. Her knife is warm. Body temperature. He doesn’t feel it split the skin before he feels the blood trickling down his neck.
“He want to kill you too?” she snarls.
Clint, whose first instinct had been to nod (which would have sliced open a vein or two), says, “Yeah.”
“Smart man.”
“I’ve always thought so,” he replies, pressing down harder.
Her breath hitches in her throat. A little bit of blood spills out the corner of her mouth. It matches the red of her hair, complements the blue of her gown.
(She’s probably never gone on a first date worried about looking like a hitman. But bleeding out under his hands, her mouth twisted in a gasp and a snarl, she doesn’t look like the type of person who goes on many dates. He wonders is he should feel sorry for her.)
“If you don’t help me get out of here, you’re signing my death certificate,” she says.
“That’s already been signed,” he tells her quietly. (Fury’d signed it. Coulson had talked Clint through the forms.) “The only way out of here is on a SHIELD stretcher. Whether you’re alive or not is up to you.”
“Your brother should have killed you when he had the chance,” she says, baring blood-stained teeth at him before her eyes roll back in her head and the knife falls out of her hand before she can take her next breath. Clint, who’s had that same thought himself a time or two, keeps applying pressure and waits for Coulson.
*
Her name’s Natasha. Natalia. Black Widow. Romanoff, Romanov, Romanova. Clint’s pretty sure there’s no way he could misspell her name on his report that wouldn’t turn out to be a legitimate variation of some kind.
Coulson had taken custody of her, given Clint two blank copies of all the reports he had to turn in, and left him alone in medical.
Clint fills everything in. They’ve bandaged him up and hooked him up to IVs. He’s dehydrated, on the edge of starvation, sleep-deprived.
Coulson’s never left him alone here before if he could help it.
Clint fills out both drafts by himself and is pretty sure that the second is worse than the first.
*
Clint hides both copies when Hill shows up for the debrief, and she fills the forms out for him when he shows her the bandages on his hands and wrists. “Defensive wounds,” he explains, when she gets to that part of the report.
“I’ve seen her,” Hill says. “Did you even try to hit back?”
“At first. But then…” Clint’s fought like that before, but not in a long time. In the years after the circus, when he’d been recovering from wounds that should have killed him but didn’t, when he’d had to remind himself to care enough to eat, when he hadn’t thought the word suicide but had looked forward to the jobs he should have been smart enough not to take—in those years, he’d fought like Natasha, Natalia, Natalie Romanoff Romanov Romanova.
Clint’s always had a simple name but he hasn’t always known who he was either.
“Then what?”
“I saw the opportunity to bring in a valuable asset,” he says. He’s repeating the words already written on the papers his lying on, scrawled in his nearly illegible hand. They’re accurate but not important. Hill’s probably gonna figure that part out on her own, but Clint’s not going to make it easy for her. “I offered her the out, and she took it.”
She sighs, because she knows him too damn well, and finishes the forms without any other follow-up questions. “Coulson’s pissed,” she says, while he painstakingly signs his name on the bottom line.
“Yeah.”
“He won’t say it, but you scared him.” He looks at her sideways, but she’s not looking at him. “Don’t go off the grid like that again,” she says, taking the forms back from him. “You scared all of us.”
*
In the fight that follows, Coulson calls Clint stupid and Clint accuses him of being an emotionless robot. Coulson leaves without saying goodbye and Clint escapes through the vents.
It takes a while to get there from medical, but there are two hideouts in the SHIELD maintenance vents that Clint is positive no one knows about. He has enough food stashed there to keep himself going for a week, maybe ten days if he rations appropriately, and he alternates between the two every twenty-four hours just to keep track of time. One is above the water-heaters, the other is right next to a fan; the changing temperatures don’t really do much for the dizziness he still feels.
He wishes he’d brought his Kindle. He wishes he’d killed the Black Widow two weeks ago when Coulson had first given him the order.
He wishes Coulson hadn’t called him stupid.
He wishes it had taken Coulson longer to figure it out.
*
Five days after the fight Clint drops back into Medical, picks the lock on the pharmacy, and passes out while trying to figure out which pills will make the world stop spinning.
*
Hill’s there when he wakes up.
“It’s funny,” she says, glaring at him with pinched lips and angry eyes. “When I told you not to go off the grid again, I didn’t realize it was opposite day.”
“I didn’t leave SHIELD property,” Clint says. His voice hurts his throat. He hasn’t spoken in a week. “I was on medical leave, so it’s not like you needed me for a mission. I gave my debrief. What’s the problem?”
She cuffs both his hands to the bed and leaves.
He picks both the locks, but it takes him nearly ten minutes, and he’s sweating by the time he’s done. He passes out before he can muster up the energy to leave.
When Coulson comes in he’s wearing plainclothes and he looks tired. Wrecked. He looks like Clint’s throat feels when he tries to talk: raw.
“You made the right call,” Coulson says, shutting the door behind him and locking it.
The entrance to the ventilation shaft in this room is right above Clint’s bed, and the window isn’t shatterproof. Coulson’s trying to keep other people out, not keep Clint in. The monitor still gives away the increase in his heart rate.
Coulson pauses and then takes a step back towards the door. “Want me to unlock it?”
Clint shakes his head. He makes himself breathe through it. They both wait for his heartbeat to slow down.
“You made the right call with Widow. She’s talking, and she’s telling us—well. She’s giving us a lot of information, but she’s also…she was ready to give up. You did the right thing. I don’t know that many other agents would have seen the signs you did. We were lucky you were there.” Coulson’s words are an apology, but his eyes are still angry.
“She okay?”
“She’s recovering faster than you are. But then, she didn’t break out of Medical AMA.” Coulson makes a move towards the chair at Clint’s bedside and Clint’s heart rate gives him away again. Coulson sighs. “I’m sorry for what I said before. I hope you know I didn’t mean—”
“Who are we right now?” Clint interrupts, his words a demand despite how weak his voice is. He has to know.
“What do you mean?” Coulson’s voice is careful now. He looks confused.
“Are you—are you Coulson? Or Phil?” (Clint understands that usually the two are the same, Phil Coulson, because he’s seen the borderland in between. He’s seen Coulson leave the building and drive home, he’s seen Phil dicing up tomatoes for his homemade sauce. He’s seen Phil Coulson’s forehead creased in concentration as he works with Clint (Clint Barton, Hawkeye) side-by-side, searching for the meaning in familiar words.)
“Considering Fury forced me to take some leave time, I guess I’m Phil.”
“He—what?”
“Apparently I was making a nuisance of myself,” Phil says, putting his hands in his pockets. “I was, well—I didn’t deal with your…with the—I wasn’t performing up to my usual standards.”
“Which means…?” Clint’s not following. It must be the drugs.
“I drove everyone crazy,” Phil says, his voice quiet and rough. “I had the probies searching the building in grid patterns for a solid thirty-six hours looking for you. I yelled at Hill. I disobeyed a direct order from Fury.”
“What order?” Clint can’t imagine how something like that could happen.
“He told me to sit down and shut up, and I told him to stick him eyepatch where the sun don’t shine.” Clint is shocked and warmed and ashamed all at once.
“I’m sorry I called you a robot.”
“I’m sorry I called you stupid.”
Neither of them are good at apologies. Coulson—Phil—tries to keep going, but the beeping of Clint’s monitors stops him. He hovers, halfway out of the room. Clint doesn’t want him to leave, but he’s having trouble catching his breath. When he does, he tells Coulson to come sit down.
Clint believes that Phil is sorry. He believes that Phil didn’t mean it when he called Clint stupid. He’s too tired (his body flashing hot and cold like he’s still in the vents, tucked up quiet in corners, trying to breathe and not think) to find the words to say that out loud so he just fumbles for Phil’s hand. He’s uncommonly clumsy because of the bandages, so Phil holds one of Clint’s hands with both of his own. Phil’s hands are tan and familiar, but there are new bruises on his knuckles. “I punched a wall,” Phil explains, following Clint’s line of sight. “It looked at me funny.”
“Good thing you taught it a lesson then, sir.” He doesn’t smile when he says it. He’s too damn tired to smile.
Phil smiles for him, and Clint relaxes for the first time since he got back, tension he doesn’t understand releasing. Phil’s hands tighten over his. Clint doesn’t need to hold on because Clint’s holding on for him.
Phil falls asleep minutes later and Clint breathes, in and out, like he’s on the range with unfamiliar words in his mouth and his bow in his hands.
*
The sleep together before they fuck. There’s months in between the two events. Months, three kitchen fires, two more fistfights (both on the job), one more bullet-wound, and the Black Widow turning into Natasha. She likes Clint and is suspicious of Phil who’s suspicious right back. She comes over for dinner sometimes but not always with forewarning.
(This is only a problem once. Well, twice. Well, maybe three times, but the third time Phil was the only one who was embarrassed. Clint just found it funny. Natasha did too, even if she still refused to smile.)
(She asks Clint, early on, if she’ll be expected to fuck all of her handlers, too. Clint tells her that she can not-fuck whoever she wants, including her handler. Once she figures out that he and Coulson still haven’t gone beyond kissing—which is awesome, enjoyable, almost enough all on its own—she teases him unmercifully. But she also helps him pick out clothes for his dates and tells him what wines he should bring. He worries at first about following her advice, but it turns out she’s right and Coulson’s pleased and so he asks her opinion more often than he should.)
He and Coulson sleep together before they fuck. Usually they take turns: one of them sleeping while the other stays on watch, in Medical on or the plane or in Coulson’s office. It’s probably good, because after they fuck the first time, Clint runs away. Phil tells him that it’s okay, they can debrief in the morning. Clint thinks he’s kidding until Phil asks him about flavored lubes over muffins.
Clint leaves after they fuck the next couple of time. Goes for runs until his thighs and calves and feet ache, or goes to the range until he can’t hold his bow up any longer, or climbs through the airshafts until even he doesn’t know where he is anymore. (Coulson always cleans them up and Clint always leaves. Coulson never tries to stop him.)
“I think I want to stay,” he says eventually. They’re in Coulson’s apartment, the lights off, the scent of garlic and oregano from dinner still permeating the air. Clint’s just returned from a mission and he already feels exhausted, beaten, worn out. Putting his clothes back on seems like too much of an effort.
Phil smiles slowly at him. “Do you want to be closer to the door, or the wall?”
“Which side do you want?”
“I want the side you don’t want,” Phil says, mumbling and blinking sleepily into his pillow. Phil looks very comfortable. He’s also lying on the side closest to the door.
Clint eyes the bed, surveys the room. “I guess…wall.” There’s a window right above the bed. A better escape route, if it comes to that.
Phil rolls closer to the door and pats the empty space on the bed like he’s summoning a frightened pet. “I’m not a dog,” Clint says, crawling cautiously to the area Phil’s made for him.
“Good boy,” Phil murmurs, patting him vaguely on the head when he slips under the covers. It’s unusual for them to be like this. Uninjured, with space to move, and safe enough that they don’t have to sleep in shifts.
Clint lies on his back. Then his side. Then his back again. Eventually Phil grumbles and grabs Clint’s arm, pulling him against Phil’s back. “It’s called spooning,” Phil says.
“I knew that.” He tries not to sound defensive.
“You okay being the big spoon? You can keep your eye on the exit this way.”
Clint’s words catch in his throat. A thrill of warmth and fear shoot up his spine. “Yeah, it’s—uh, it’s fine.” His knees are pressed behind Phil’s knees. His chest presses against Phil’s back when he breathes. “What do I do with my other arm?”
“It’s an age-old problem,” Phil says, sagely and sleepily. “The elbow dilemma.”
He doesn’t fall asleep that night. Everything hurts, and also, also there’s someone touching him. His instincts take a couple of nights before they catch up and let him relax enough to actually sleep.
The first time they fuck and then sleep together (they have a lot of firsts) Clint sleeps with his arm under Phil’s head. The next time he folds it between them like a broken wing; after that he stretches it above his head like Peter Pan.
He broaches the topic with ‘Tasha, who takes it as an invitation for some inventive sparring. His entire body, but especially his arms, are screaming with pain when he drags himself to Phil’s that night. The two of them rearrange about a dozen times before Phil (asking permission every step of the way) switches sides of the bed and spoons Clint, one arm underneath his head, like a pillow, the other crossed over his chest.
“I’ll watch your back,” Phil says. Phil’s lying between Clint and the wall, his knees tucked against Clint’s knees. His chest presses against Clint’s shoulder blades when he breathes. Clint doesn’t try to rearrange them, and quiets the part of him that wants to.
“I know,” Clint says instead, and feels Phil smile against his neck.
When ‘Tasha finds out that he solved his problem by becoming the little spoon she laughs at him, then congratulates him, then kicks his ass all over the gym for an afternoon, helping him figure out new ways to slip out of the loose hold Coulson keeps around him while they sleep. It’s the first time Clint hears her laugh.
*
The first time Phil says it, he writes it down. They’re lying in bed, sheets tangled and blankets on the floor, talking about maybe getting a cat (that Clint wants to call Phlegm, whereas Coulson’s campaigning for Freud), when Phil reaches over to the bedside drawer and pulls out a slip of paper. He hands it to Clint, who reads it. And rereads it. And asks Phil to say it out loud.
“Please,” Clint says.
“But you—”
“I want to hear you say it,” Clint whispers. He can almost hear it in his own head, each letter sounded out, each word built carefully on its own, but the sentence as a whole is unsteady. Each word is a leg in an uneven tripod. He wants to hear it in Coulson’s voice. “Please, Phil?”
Coulson props himself up on his elbow and smiles down at Clint. “I love you,” Phil says, as if it’s an easy thing to say, as if it makes him happy to love Clint.
As always, Phil makes words mean something new. He draws the disparate elements of I love you together and connects them, redefines them, hands them to Clint so that he can keep them in the new building of his brain that he’s constructing one lesson at a time.
His body has always known things that his mind has to work to understand, so he follows its lead. He crushes the letter in his fist and grabs onto Phil too tightly. Phil murmurs something against Clint’s head, kissing his ear, rocking him gently and then settling them with Phil on his back and Clint wrapped around him, holding onto Phil and his words with everything he is.
*
Trick Shot’s book and all the things kept safe within its pages burns in New Mexico. Clint loses the last third of the book which he has yet to read, the movie tickets from his first date, a photo of him with Phil that Hill had taken, a newspaper clipping about the Amazing Hawkeye, a picture of Barney holding him when he was a baby, his latest promotion letter, and Phil’s first I love you.
He loses his mind and the book and Phil, and relearns Yes in the brilliant blue glow of Loki’s mind.
Author:
hoosierbitch Series: Dyslexia!Verse
Rating: R
Notes: The first part of this series is As It Is Written. The second part was written by the amazing
arsenicjade. You can find the whole thing via my LJ dyslexia!verse tag, or on AO3.)Content Advisory: References to child abuse and neglect. If you need more information, please contact me, I’m happy to help.
Thanks:
ivorysilk improved this chapter immeasurably. Best beta ever.Summary: Third dates, elbows in the appropriate place, and laughter.
*
Coulson kisses him again before he drops Clint off at SHIELD headquarters. (As second dates go (especially considering the non-event that their first date had been), Clint’s putting this in the win column.) Lola’s gear-shift digs into his stomach and Coulson puts his hand on the side of Clint’s head and it feels perfect.
But once he gets out of the car he feels unsafe. He feels like gravity’s failed and his body’s coming apart from the ground under his feet. It’s new, and terrifying, and he blames it all on Coulson.
He wants to call Coulson back.
He doesn’t call.
They’ve planned their next date for a week from today. Coulson said he was going to make dinner in his apartment and asked Clint to bring the wine. (He didn’t ask if Clint could manage it, if he knew where to go or what to bring, if he had enough money. Clint likes that Coulson trusts him.)
When he gets to his room he tucks the movie tickets into Trick Shot’s book.
His dreams taste like popcorn and Sprite, but they still smell like gunpowder.
It’s not often that Coulson gets sent on long-distance jobs off-comm, much less month-long ops without even being allowed to say goodbye. It’s the longest they’ve been out of contact since Clint started at SHIELD. And whatever this mission is, the details are locked down tight. No matter how much digging Clint does, he can’t find any info about where Coulson’s gone or what he’s doing. Hill humors his pestering at first, but eventually she bans him from Command and tells him to chill the fuck out.
Sitwell sends him on some easy gigs to keep him from getting underfoot. They’re mostly surveillance jobs. Clint would have enjoyed the impromptu vacations if he wasn’t so worried about Coulson (and if he didn’t have so much maneuvering to do to hide his unfiled paperwork. He’s out of practice, and Sitwell’s no slouch).
Hill’s the one who calls him when Coulson comes back, so he forgives her for withholding information earlier on. Because Coulson is…
Coulson’s sick when he comes back. Not Medical-sick, not body-sick. The doctors check him over and don’t protest when Hill tells Clint to sign him out. Coulson says thanks (the last thing he says that night) and lets Clint and Maria walk him down to the parking garage. He hands Clint the keys when Clint asks for them and doesn’t seem to notice that Clint’s planning on driving his car. Hill, on the other hand, is as shocked as Clint.
He reminds Coulson to put on his seatbelt and he complies. When they get to Coulson’s apartment, Clint parks, turns the car off, opens Coulson’s door for him, undoes the man’s seatbelt, and pulls him out. Coulson sags against the hood and Clint locks everything up before hoisting Coulson’s arm over his shoulder and carrying the man inside.
Clint’s dealt with shock victims before, but never like this. It’s never been someone he loved. He feels helpless, useless in a way he almost never lets himself feel.
He opens the door to the apartment with the key Phil gave him when they started doing dinner regularly. It’s strange to find it dark and not already filled with the smell of Coulson’s cooking. He thinks that it’s a good thing Coulson doesn’t keep plants at home. Clint’s been watering the ones in his office, but it hadn’t seemed right to come here alone.
Coulson lets Clint take him into the bedroom without complaining. Almost without noticing. Clint leans him against the wall, since Coulson doesn’t seem capable of standing on his own anymore, and strips Coulson out of his suit piece by piece. His tie is perfectly done and his shirt’s tucked in. Coulson had obviously waited to fall apart until the last possible minute.
Clint gets him out of his shoes, slacks, jacket, and shirt, and starts to shift him over to the bed. Coulson, for the first time since he got back, reaches out for Clint. Wraps his arms around him and holds on so tight it hurts. There aren’t any bruises on Coulson’s body, no wounds that Clint can see; Medical wouldn’t have let him go if he’d actually been injured, but Clint still wishes for a physical hurt that he could help to heal.
Instead he just holds Coulson while he cries. As far as he can tell, with Coulson’s face pressed up against his chest, there are no tears. Coulson’s body shudders and hoarse cries crawl their way up from somewhere inside of him that Clint hadn’t known existed. Clint holds him, holds him up, holds him until he thinks they’ll both evaporate; Clint’s useless half-formed words (they’re lies, but they’re all he has: it’ll be okay, you’re okay, and, when those are gone, I’ve got you) and Coulson’s nonexistent tears.
When Coulson quiets down Clint tucks him into bed. He leaves Coulson there while he double-checks that all the doors and windows are locked and the alarm system is set, and then he curls up on top of Coulson’s covers, between Coulson and the door, on guard. Coulson eventually falls asleep, but Clint keeps watch like a dream-catcher, ready to wake him at the slightest sign of a nightmare.
Coulson’s talking in complete sentences again (dry, sarcastic, almost-believably-normal sentences) and Clint’s in the cafeteria to grab snacks because he’s almost caught up on his paperwork and deserves a cookie or five when he hears someone call Coulson a fag.
Clint, who’s been dreading this since before their first date, turns around and looks the other man up and down. He’s large and blond and eating an apple at the corner table, talking to a couple of other guys. He must be new.
“I think I misheard you,” Clint says, walking over and interrupting the table’s ongoing conversation. His pockets are full of granola bars to restock some of his hideaways, but he’s got Coulson’s favorite crappy dessert treats in his hands. “What’s that you were saying about Agent Coulson?”
When the other man calls Coulson a fag again, Clint drops the desserts and launches himself across the table. It’s been a while since he was in a good old-fashioned brawl, and it’s fun while it lasts. He gets in enough hits to feel placated when the other agents finally separate them. He manages to pocket a package of Twinkies that miraculously hadn’t gotten squished before Sitwell pins his arms and frog-marches him out of the room.
The other guy is still on the ground. There’s blood on Clint’s sleeve, splattering the SHIELD insignia. There are agents he recognizes standing around looking worried, and someone’s called for medical.
Clint feels only a vicious satisfaction.
It’s pretty clear from the video surveillance who started the fight. Clint analyzes his form, makes a note to practice his left uppercut (he’d left himself wide open, it’s embarrassing) and smiles at the blonde woman across the table in the interrogation room. “Sorry, what was the question?”
“Why did you attack Security Specialist Franklin?”
“Felt like it.”
“Agent Barton, I feel I should remind you of the severity of your situation. You’re looking at a minimum of three months’ suspension for physically assaulting another agent. There’s footage of the attack, a room full of trained witnesses, Franklin’s word that he did nothing to provoke you, and your…somewhat less than adequate explanation.”
Clint shifts in his seat. He hasn’t spent that much time in lock-up, but the times he had weren’t exactly pleasant. (He’s having flashbacks of being thirteen and scared and lonely for his brother.)
“I’m pretty sure nothing I say is going to make up for punching…what his name…in the face, so what’s the use?”
The woman leans forward, her elbows on Clint’s spread-open personnel folder, and tells him, in a voice that suggests that if it mattered to him, then it’ll matter to her.
Clint doesn’t believe her for a second. “Can I talk to Coulson before I talk to you?”
“No. I don’t want you changing your story.” Her tone remains sympathetic. Clint tries not to glare at her, because he knows she’s just doing her job.
He really wants Coulson.
He makes himself take a deep breath and thinks of Coulson saying his name, quiet and calm. Holds onto the memory for a long beat. The silence stretches a moment too long.
“SHIELD’s got rules about discrimination, right?”
She leans back and nods at him. Her expression hasn’t changed at all.
“That include name-calling?”
“It depends. What did he call you?”
Franklin had been talking about Coulson, not Clint, but it makes it easier to be honest if he can at least lie about that. “Fag.”
He feels uncomfortable saying the word now. It feels like years, like a lifetime since he’d spit the word at Coulson. It still feels like yesterday when he’d realized that the word was a weapon, and that he’d hurt Coulson with it.
Franklin, Clint’s willing to bet, had probably known exactly what damage that word could inflict.
“Did you have any interactions with Security Specialist Franklin before he called you a fag?”
“You mean did I grab his dick or something?”
“No. I meant, is there any reason that you know of why Franklin would have a grudge against you? Why he’d want to hurt you, or get you in trouble?”
“I honestly don’t know.” He really didn’t. Coulson’s one of the kindest men Clint’s ever known, even if he does try to keep his heart under wraps, and Clint’s never even seen Franklin before that afternoon.
She nods and looks down at her papers. Clint really hopes she’s not going to make him fill anything out. “Hang tight,” she says. “I’ll be back soon.” Her eyes, Clint notes, look different now. The sympathy in them seems a fraction more genuine. Clint reminds himself not to hope.
She takes her folder with her so he just stares at the table and counts the seconds in his head. Coulson had told him once that it freaked people out when Clint went still. He hopes he gives whoever’s watching the surveillance feed of his room nightmares.
After about two hours, she comes back in. “Two witnesses have confirmed your story. On behalf of internal investigations, I apologize for Security Specialist Franklin’s conduct. You can be assured that he will be appropriately reprimanded. You, however, will be on one week’s unpaid suspension, and when you return, you will attend mandatory anger-management courses. Physical violence isn’t the right way to respond to every attack, Special Agent.”
“Just most of them.”
“In your line of work? Probably.” Her eyes are green, Clint notes, and tired.
She holds the door open for him, but he doesn’t feel like he can leave yet. “I know he’s probably just an asshole,” Clint says, “but maybe Franklin just didn’t know any better.”
“He’ll be taking a sensitivity training course,” she says, her eyes softening for the first time as she looks at him. “If that’s the reason, we’ll take care of it.”
“And if he’s just an asshole, I’ll keep punching him.”
She sighs, but almost fondly; it reminds him of his mom. “I hope I never have to see you again. Good luck, Special Agent. Thank you for your time.”
“Whatever.” He waves a hand over his shoulder and books it to his room. All his stuff’s still there.
Coulson stops by pretty soon after that and explains to Clint that one week’s suspension doesn’t mean that he has to leave the base. He can stay in his apartment. “Or you can stay in mine,” Phil says, shrugging and not making eye contact. “You’ve got the whole week off, you might as well relax a little. Watch some TV.”
“Maybe make you dinner,” Clint muses, thinking about what he might be able to make without risking burning down Coulson’s nice kitchen.
“That would…that would be nice,” Coulson says. “I, uh—I hear you defended my honor today.”
Clint shrugs. He doesn’t know who had sussed out the actual details of the situation, but it’s almost reassuring that Coulson still knows everything. When Coulson backs him up against the wall and kisses him, Clint goes easily. When Coulson finally lets him up for air, Clint gives him his slightly-squished Twinkies.
Coulson says thanks, and not just for the Twinkies. Clint twists them around and kisses Phil until his lips are swollen, his eyelids lowered lazily.
(He does set fire to Coulson’s kitchen, but only once, and only for a little bit. Coulson’s mostly just angry that Clint shot all the fire alarms.
Coulson, Clint discovers, is even hotter when he’s angry.)
There’s paperwork waiting for Clint the next morning. “Declaration of romantic intention,” he sounds out. “Declaration of—wait, what?”
“It’s a form,” Phil says, “alerting SHIELD as to the altered nature of our relationship.”
“There’s paperwork for this shit? And you want to fill it out? Wait, what am I saying, of course there is, and of course you do. No.” Clint tries to look firm, and not like he’s sulking.
Or scared.
“All you have to do is sign.”
“No.”
“This doesn’t change anything,” Coulson says. “It just protects us in case something—like yesterday—goes wrong.”
“Who’s going to know? Who gets to read this?”
“Fury. Hill. Probably Sitwell. And anyone with clearance levels higher than ten.”
“Mine’s only nine.”
“Then you should feel lucky I’m letting you take a look at these papers. They’re classified, you know.” Coulson’s eyes are knowing as he looks at Clint. Clint avoids his gaze.
He takes the forms back to his apartment and tries to read them. Two days later he brings them back, asks Phil if signing them is really the best thing to do, and writes his name down when Phil says Yes.
“Fury wants to see me.”
“Oh.”
“Fury’s going to kill me.”
“Fury is not going to…Fury is probably not going to—”
“I am never coming to you for reassurances ever again. I am never signing anything you give me ever again. I am never—”
“If your meeting’s at two, you better run.”
Clint swears, kisses Phil for good luck (apparently good-luck-kissing is one of the normal things Clint didn’t know about, a Midwestern ritual or something; Phil insists on it whenever they have the chance), and heads to Fury’s office.
“Phil is one of my oldest friends,” Fury says. He’s holding Phil’s paperwork—Clint’s signature at the bottom, lopsided as always—in his hands.
Clint tries to dig his way out of his chair using his shoulder blades. If he presses against it hard enough, it’ll have to work eventually, right? “I know. I promise, I’m not going to hurt him. I’m not fucking with him, I—”
“Phil is one of my oldest friends, but—and this is very important for you to hear, Barton, so listen closely—that is not as important as the fact that he is your superior officer. If you ever, ever, feel that he is abusing his power, or that you are being taken advantage of, or if there’s anything you need that you feel uncomfortable asking for from Phil, I want you to come to me or Hill. You’re an important asset to SHIELD, and your health and safety, both on and off the job, is paramount. Do you understand?”
Clint’s pretty sure that he understands, he’s just not sure if he believes. “Are you serious?”
“I don’t joke, Barton. Now get the fuck out of my office.”
“Right. Okay. Uh—thank you, sir.”
“You’re welcome. Now leave and shut the door behind you.”
When he tells Phil about it, he laughs, and then smiles, and then bakes Fury a muffin basket.
Clint fucking hates Russia.
“Hold on,” he says, keeping his gun trained on his target, straining to keep an eye on every possible movement that her body might make. She’s many different kinds of threat, and Clint’s down to his last precious reserves of energy. He’s tired, hungry, worn down to the bone. The knife-wounds scattered along his forearms and hands where he’d fended off her attacks have stopped hurting because most of him has gone numb. “This whole thing would be a whole lot easier for me if I just shot you, so please—please just give me a minute so I don’t have to do that.”
She shifts her weight, relaxing against the wall where Clint’s cornered her. He wants to laugh with how little he believes her tell.
Clint thinks. There’s something here; something off-pattern. Something sideways that he can’t quite put his finger on.
He shifts his weight and she responds in kind; ready to move if he moves. “You remind me of somebody,” Clint says.
“If you’re about to say that I remind of your girlfriend, I will rip off your tiny dick and feed it to you.” Her voice is flat.
Yeah. The resemblance is definitely there. Clint opens his mouth and shoots her in the split second of waiting-to-listen that people habitually give to someone about to talk. Clint, who’s stumbled unexpectedly into that moment too many times not to learn how to take advantage of it, strips off his coat and presses it against the gunshot wound in her gut, covering the red blossoming on her dark blue gown before it has a chance to spread.
She gasps and presses a knife that Clint hadn’t known she was carrying up against his jugular.
“Help me get out of here or I’ll kill you,” she says, her hand not wavering.
“You remind me of my brother,” Clint says conversationally, pressing the coat tighter to stop the flow of blood and trying not to swallow. Her knife is warm. Body temperature. He doesn’t feel it split the skin before he feels the blood trickling down his neck.
“He want to kill you too?” she snarls.
Clint, whose first instinct had been to nod (which would have sliced open a vein or two), says, “Yeah.”
“Smart man.”
“I’ve always thought so,” he replies, pressing down harder.
Her breath hitches in her throat. A little bit of blood spills out the corner of her mouth. It matches the red of her hair, complements the blue of her gown.
(She’s probably never gone on a first date worried about looking like a hitman. But bleeding out under his hands, her mouth twisted in a gasp and a snarl, she doesn’t look like the type of person who goes on many dates. He wonders is he should feel sorry for her.)
“If you don’t help me get out of here, you’re signing my death certificate,” she says.
“That’s already been signed,” he tells her quietly. (Fury’d signed it. Coulson had talked Clint through the forms.) “The only way out of here is on a SHIELD stretcher. Whether you’re alive or not is up to you.”
“Your brother should have killed you when he had the chance,” she says, baring blood-stained teeth at him before her eyes roll back in her head and the knife falls out of her hand before she can take her next breath. Clint, who’s had that same thought himself a time or two, keeps applying pressure and waits for Coulson.
Her name’s Natasha. Natalia. Black Widow. Romanoff, Romanov, Romanova. Clint’s pretty sure there’s no way he could misspell her name on his report that wouldn’t turn out to be a legitimate variation of some kind.
Coulson had taken custody of her, given Clint two blank copies of all the reports he had to turn in, and left him alone in medical.
Clint fills everything in. They’ve bandaged him up and hooked him up to IVs. He’s dehydrated, on the edge of starvation, sleep-deprived.
Coulson’s never left him alone here before if he could help it.
Clint fills out both drafts by himself and is pretty sure that the second is worse than the first.
Clint hides both copies when Hill shows up for the debrief, and she fills the forms out for him when he shows her the bandages on his hands and wrists. “Defensive wounds,” he explains, when she gets to that part of the report.
“I’ve seen her,” Hill says. “Did you even try to hit back?”
“At first. But then…” Clint’s fought like that before, but not in a long time. In the years after the circus, when he’d been recovering from wounds that should have killed him but didn’t, when he’d had to remind himself to care enough to eat, when he hadn’t thought the word suicide but had looked forward to the jobs he should have been smart enough not to take—in those years, he’d fought like Natasha, Natalia, Natalie Romanoff Romanov Romanova.
Clint’s always had a simple name but he hasn’t always known who he was either.
“Then what?”
“I saw the opportunity to bring in a valuable asset,” he says. He’s repeating the words already written on the papers his lying on, scrawled in his nearly illegible hand. They’re accurate but not important. Hill’s probably gonna figure that part out on her own, but Clint’s not going to make it easy for her. “I offered her the out, and she took it.”
She sighs, because she knows him too damn well, and finishes the forms without any other follow-up questions. “Coulson’s pissed,” she says, while he painstakingly signs his name on the bottom line.
“Yeah.”
“He won’t say it, but you scared him.” He looks at her sideways, but she’s not looking at him. “Don’t go off the grid like that again,” she says, taking the forms back from him. “You scared all of us.”
In the fight that follows, Coulson calls Clint stupid and Clint accuses him of being an emotionless robot. Coulson leaves without saying goodbye and Clint escapes through the vents.
It takes a while to get there from medical, but there are two hideouts in the SHIELD maintenance vents that Clint is positive no one knows about. He has enough food stashed there to keep himself going for a week, maybe ten days if he rations appropriately, and he alternates between the two every twenty-four hours just to keep track of time. One is above the water-heaters, the other is right next to a fan; the changing temperatures don’t really do much for the dizziness he still feels.
He wishes he’d brought his Kindle. He wishes he’d killed the Black Widow two weeks ago when Coulson had first given him the order.
He wishes Coulson hadn’t called him stupid.
He wishes it had taken Coulson longer to figure it out.
Five days after the fight Clint drops back into Medical, picks the lock on the pharmacy, and passes out while trying to figure out which pills will make the world stop spinning.
Hill’s there when he wakes up.
“It’s funny,” she says, glaring at him with pinched lips and angry eyes. “When I told you not to go off the grid again, I didn’t realize it was opposite day.”
“I didn’t leave SHIELD property,” Clint says. His voice hurts his throat. He hasn’t spoken in a week. “I was on medical leave, so it’s not like you needed me for a mission. I gave my debrief. What’s the problem?”
She cuffs both his hands to the bed and leaves.
He picks both the locks, but it takes him nearly ten minutes, and he’s sweating by the time he’s done. He passes out before he can muster up the energy to leave.
When Coulson comes in he’s wearing plainclothes and he looks tired. Wrecked. He looks like Clint’s throat feels when he tries to talk: raw.
“You made the right call,” Coulson says, shutting the door behind him and locking it.
The entrance to the ventilation shaft in this room is right above Clint’s bed, and the window isn’t shatterproof. Coulson’s trying to keep other people out, not keep Clint in. The monitor still gives away the increase in his heart rate.
Coulson pauses and then takes a step back towards the door. “Want me to unlock it?”
Clint shakes his head. He makes himself breathe through it. They both wait for his heartbeat to slow down.
“You made the right call with Widow. She’s talking, and she’s telling us—well. She’s giving us a lot of information, but she’s also…she was ready to give up. You did the right thing. I don’t know that many other agents would have seen the signs you did. We were lucky you were there.” Coulson’s words are an apology, but his eyes are still angry.
“She okay?”
“She’s recovering faster than you are. But then, she didn’t break out of Medical AMA.” Coulson makes a move towards the chair at Clint’s bedside and Clint’s heart rate gives him away again. Coulson sighs. “I’m sorry for what I said before. I hope you know I didn’t mean—”
“Who are we right now?” Clint interrupts, his words a demand despite how weak his voice is. He has to know.
“What do you mean?” Coulson’s voice is careful now. He looks confused.
“Are you—are you Coulson? Or Phil?” (Clint understands that usually the two are the same, Phil Coulson, because he’s seen the borderland in between. He’s seen Coulson leave the building and drive home, he’s seen Phil dicing up tomatoes for his homemade sauce. He’s seen Phil Coulson’s forehead creased in concentration as he works with Clint (Clint Barton, Hawkeye) side-by-side, searching for the meaning in familiar words.)
“Considering Fury forced me to take some leave time, I guess I’m Phil.”
“He—what?”
“Apparently I was making a nuisance of myself,” Phil says, putting his hands in his pockets. “I was, well—I didn’t deal with your…with the—I wasn’t performing up to my usual standards.”
“Which means…?” Clint’s not following. It must be the drugs.
“I drove everyone crazy,” Phil says, his voice quiet and rough. “I had the probies searching the building in grid patterns for a solid thirty-six hours looking for you. I yelled at Hill. I disobeyed a direct order from Fury.”
“What order?” Clint can’t imagine how something like that could happen.
“He told me to sit down and shut up, and I told him to stick him eyepatch where the sun don’t shine.” Clint is shocked and warmed and ashamed all at once.
“I’m sorry I called you a robot.”
“I’m sorry I called you stupid.”
Neither of them are good at apologies. Coulson—Phil—tries to keep going, but the beeping of Clint’s monitors stops him. He hovers, halfway out of the room. Clint doesn’t want him to leave, but he’s having trouble catching his breath. When he does, he tells Coulson to come sit down.
Clint believes that Phil is sorry. He believes that Phil didn’t mean it when he called Clint stupid. He’s too tired (his body flashing hot and cold like he’s still in the vents, tucked up quiet in corners, trying to breathe and not think) to find the words to say that out loud so he just fumbles for Phil’s hand. He’s uncommonly clumsy because of the bandages, so Phil holds one of Clint’s hands with both of his own. Phil’s hands are tan and familiar, but there are new bruises on his knuckles. “I punched a wall,” Phil explains, following Clint’s line of sight. “It looked at me funny.”
“Good thing you taught it a lesson then, sir.” He doesn’t smile when he says it. He’s too damn tired to smile.
Phil smiles for him, and Clint relaxes for the first time since he got back, tension he doesn’t understand releasing. Phil’s hands tighten over his. Clint doesn’t need to hold on because Clint’s holding on for him.
Phil falls asleep minutes later and Clint breathes, in and out, like he’s on the range with unfamiliar words in his mouth and his bow in his hands.
The sleep together before they fuck. There’s months in between the two events. Months, three kitchen fires, two more fistfights (both on the job), one more bullet-wound, and the Black Widow turning into Natasha. She likes Clint and is suspicious of Phil who’s suspicious right back. She comes over for dinner sometimes but not always with forewarning.
(This is only a problem once. Well, twice. Well, maybe three times, but the third time Phil was the only one who was embarrassed. Clint just found it funny. Natasha did too, even if she still refused to smile.)
(She asks Clint, early on, if she’ll be expected to fuck all of her handlers, too. Clint tells her that she can not-fuck whoever she wants, including her handler. Once she figures out that he and Coulson still haven’t gone beyond kissing—which is awesome, enjoyable, almost enough all on its own—she teases him unmercifully. But she also helps him pick out clothes for his dates and tells him what wines he should bring. He worries at first about following her advice, but it turns out she’s right and Coulson’s pleased and so he asks her opinion more often than he should.)
He and Coulson sleep together before they fuck. Usually they take turns: one of them sleeping while the other stays on watch, in Medical on or the plane or in Coulson’s office. It’s probably good, because after they fuck the first time, Clint runs away. Phil tells him that it’s okay, they can debrief in the morning. Clint thinks he’s kidding until Phil asks him about flavored lubes over muffins.
Clint leaves after they fuck the next couple of time. Goes for runs until his thighs and calves and feet ache, or goes to the range until he can’t hold his bow up any longer, or climbs through the airshafts until even he doesn’t know where he is anymore. (Coulson always cleans them up and Clint always leaves. Coulson never tries to stop him.)
“I think I want to stay,” he says eventually. They’re in Coulson’s apartment, the lights off, the scent of garlic and oregano from dinner still permeating the air. Clint’s just returned from a mission and he already feels exhausted, beaten, worn out. Putting his clothes back on seems like too much of an effort.
Phil smiles slowly at him. “Do you want to be closer to the door, or the wall?”
“Which side do you want?”
“I want the side you don’t want,” Phil says, mumbling and blinking sleepily into his pillow. Phil looks very comfortable. He’s also lying on the side closest to the door.
Clint eyes the bed, surveys the room. “I guess…wall.” There’s a window right above the bed. A better escape route, if it comes to that.
Phil rolls closer to the door and pats the empty space on the bed like he’s summoning a frightened pet. “I’m not a dog,” Clint says, crawling cautiously to the area Phil’s made for him.
“Good boy,” Phil murmurs, patting him vaguely on the head when he slips under the covers. It’s unusual for them to be like this. Uninjured, with space to move, and safe enough that they don’t have to sleep in shifts.
Clint lies on his back. Then his side. Then his back again. Eventually Phil grumbles and grabs Clint’s arm, pulling him against Phil’s back. “It’s called spooning,” Phil says.
“I knew that.” He tries not to sound defensive.
“You okay being the big spoon? You can keep your eye on the exit this way.”
Clint’s words catch in his throat. A thrill of warmth and fear shoot up his spine. “Yeah, it’s—uh, it’s fine.” His knees are pressed behind Phil’s knees. His chest presses against Phil’s back when he breathes. “What do I do with my other arm?”
“It’s an age-old problem,” Phil says, sagely and sleepily. “The elbow dilemma.”
He doesn’t fall asleep that night. Everything hurts, and also, also there’s someone touching him. His instincts take a couple of nights before they catch up and let him relax enough to actually sleep.
The first time they fuck and then sleep together (they have a lot of firsts) Clint sleeps with his arm under Phil’s head. The next time he folds it between them like a broken wing; after that he stretches it above his head like Peter Pan.
He broaches the topic with ‘Tasha, who takes it as an invitation for some inventive sparring. His entire body, but especially his arms, are screaming with pain when he drags himself to Phil’s that night. The two of them rearrange about a dozen times before Phil (asking permission every step of the way) switches sides of the bed and spoons Clint, one arm underneath his head, like a pillow, the other crossed over his chest.
“I’ll watch your back,” Phil says. Phil’s lying between Clint and the wall, his knees tucked against Clint’s knees. His chest presses against Clint’s shoulder blades when he breathes. Clint doesn’t try to rearrange them, and quiets the part of him that wants to.
“I know,” Clint says instead, and feels Phil smile against his neck.
When ‘Tasha finds out that he solved his problem by becoming the little spoon she laughs at him, then congratulates him, then kicks his ass all over the gym for an afternoon, helping him figure out new ways to slip out of the loose hold Coulson keeps around him while they sleep. It’s the first time Clint hears her laugh.
The first time Phil says it, he writes it down. They’re lying in bed, sheets tangled and blankets on the floor, talking about maybe getting a cat (that Clint wants to call Phlegm, whereas Coulson’s campaigning for Freud), when Phil reaches over to the bedside drawer and pulls out a slip of paper. He hands it to Clint, who reads it. And rereads it. And asks Phil to say it out loud.
“Please,” Clint says.
“But you—”
“I want to hear you say it,” Clint whispers. He can almost hear it in his own head, each letter sounded out, each word built carefully on its own, but the sentence as a whole is unsteady. Each word is a leg in an uneven tripod. He wants to hear it in Coulson’s voice. “Please, Phil?”
Coulson props himself up on his elbow and smiles down at Clint. “I love you,” Phil says, as if it’s an easy thing to say, as if it makes him happy to love Clint.
As always, Phil makes words mean something new. He draws the disparate elements of I love you together and connects them, redefines them, hands them to Clint so that he can keep them in the new building of his brain that he’s constructing one lesson at a time.
His body has always known things that his mind has to work to understand, so he follows its lead. He crushes the letter in his fist and grabs onto Phil too tightly. Phil murmurs something against Clint’s head, kissing his ear, rocking him gently and then settling them with Phil on his back and Clint wrapped around him, holding onto Phil and his words with everything he is.
Trick Shot’s book and all the things kept safe within its pages burns in New Mexico. Clint loses the last third of the book which he has yet to read, the movie tickets from his first date, a photo of him with Phil that Hill had taken, a newspaper clipping about the Amazing Hawkeye, a picture of Barney holding him when he was a baby, his latest promotion letter, and Phil’s first I love you.
He loses his mind and the book and Phil, and relearns Yes in the brilliant blue glow of Loki’s mind.
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"He does set fire to Coulson’s kitchen, but only once, and only for a little bit. Coulson’s mostly just angry that Clint shot all the fire alarms."
Wonderful chapter and series!!!
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