Chapter Text
Love is a 4-Letter Word
“ ~I’ve lived with him, fought with him, starved with him~ ”
Natasha wasn’t sure where Clint had learned to fly or why Nick Fury trusted him to return a jet in one piece but not to cook in the communal kitchens without burning down the base. She supposed there must be some sort of story there. She supposed she could ask, or she could just wait for Clint to tell her. Like as not, he would. For a deaf man he liked to talk a great deal, as if he were attempting to compensate for the silence all around him by filling up the void with fruitless sentences, pointless, silly words. Words like candy, unnecessary and sweet. Natasha found herself wanting to hoard them like a small child’s stash of Halloween loot, to be savored in the dark winter months, bright spots of color and spun sugar.
She didn’t tell Clint this.
He probably knew anyway.
Matt certainly did. Her son had taken to observing the two of them with his head tipped to the side, listening to what they said and what they didn’t say with a small, knowing smile curling at the corners of his lips.
That boy was too much like her sometimes.
Matt liked his secrets. He liked other people’s secrets. He liked knowing things, storing up all that information like a squirrel on the edge of starvation. It was all about control, after all. Knowing everything there was to know about every variable kept you safe, secure, in control.
Natasha wondered if she needed to teach him how to trust. Natasha wondered if she should. Either way she wasn’t the right person for the job. She looked over to the man in the pilot’s chair. Clint leaned back, casual in his seat, keeping the plane on course for home as dawn streaked the clouds with gold around them. Clint loved her. She knew he did. Or he thought he did.
Natasha…wanted…something. Clarity, perhaps. She didn’t know how to feel the feelings that seemed to be crowding in all around her, creeping up on all sides. It had been one thing when it was just Matt, so much like her but with so much potential to be better. Now, with Clint…
Natasha didn’t know. And she didn’t like not knowing.
Clint had asked her a question, hours ago now. At the beginning of the flight, guaranteeing her six hours without an escape. And now he sat, ever so casual, piloting the plane. Waiting. For her.
Do you love me?
“Define love for me.” She said into the stillness.
“Hmm?” He tipped his head to the side, considering. Clint wore the gesture differently than Matt. When Matt did it, he was like a cat, listening, poised for a leap. When Clint did it, he was like a dog, and it was an easy, lolling motion.
“I do not think I am capable of feeling love. So, define it for me.” Her voice was dry, but there was a sharp challenge hidden in the soft syllables.
Clint snorted, “BS. Everyone can feel love. Even psychopaths can feel love. And you’re not even a psychopath, so I don’t know what you’re worried about.” He gave her a crooked smile, but it seemed almost…strained.
“I do not think I have the capacity. I think it was cut out of me years ago,” her voice was hard and sharp, but the edges weren’t cutting him, they were just ripping her up inside, “So prove me wrong. Define love.”
Clint sighed, “Nat, love is… Okay, you know when you see something really, really, completely, amazingly, awesomely, incredible? Something that just…shakes you up and changes your world permanently? And you just want to share it with someone? And not just because you think it’d be something you think they would like; but because it’s something that moved you; that took your breath away, and you just want someone to feel it with you too?”
Natasha nodded, the gesture abbreviated and uncertain.
“Okay, so when you see or find that really amazing thing you just have to share; who’s on your list? Who’re the first people you want to share that with?”
Natasha raised an eyebrow, “Is this rhetorical?”
“Nope. I’ve just arbitrarily designated this as the Zone of Truth. Spill. All your secrets. You have twenty seconds. And I don’t want any crappy secrets about government spies and weapons programs, just the juicy gossip.” He grinned at her, unrepentant.
Natasha huffed a laugh and gave him a Mona Lisa smile. “Then Matt. You and Matt. That’s my list.”
“See? That means you love us. Which I already knew. So. There you go.”
Natasha shook her head, “That’s completely arbitrary.”
Clint shrugged, unbothered, “Then go out and find your own definition of love. That’s the one I’ve got. And I kind of like it. It covers all the bases, all the types of love. Family, friends, partners, everything.”
“Partners?” Natasha arched and eyebrow at him.
“Yeah, partners.” He grinned at her. “By the way, you’re on my list too.”
“Really?”
“Right at the top. Along with your crazy parkour-ing baby ninja.”
Natasha hummed lightly, “Family?”
“Yeah, partner. We’re a family. A real family. With love and everything.”
“With love and everything,” Natasha murmured with a soft, strange smile. She wasn’t sure if she believed Clint or not, but when he reached over and took her hand with callous-rough fingertips and dropped a soft kiss first on her knuckles, then on her palm, then on the soft skin inside her wrist, she smiled at him. And together they flew home.
“ ~ If that’s not love, what is? ~ ”