Archive of Our Own ^beta

Bruce looks up at the sudden break in silence, clears his throat and timidly goes back to pushing around the croutons in his Caesar salad. “She’s doing really well.” He tells T’Challa, “Best TA I’ve ever had. She’s smarter than me, T’Challa.”

“She is exceptionally bright, yes.” T’Challa chuckles, “She speaks very highly of you, Bruce. All I hear about when I call her is Dr. Banner and his new experiments.”

Bruce blushes lightly. “She’s wasting her time with me, honestly. She should have her own lab, I’m running out of things to teach her.” The girl teaches him more than the other way around. She’s already outlining her dissertation.

T’Challa opens a manilla folder and begins caring through its contents. “I must ask that you never tell her that. I would certainly never hear the end of it.”

He stuffs his face with lettuce and nods absently. He’s told Shuri, many times, but she always brushes him off. The girl is a certifiable genius, a quadruple major sophomore at the age of 17, and at this point Bruce doesn’t know how he’d function without her. She practically runs his lab for him, and sometimes he has to tell her to stop grading papers and buzz off so that he can read a few.

“And how are you doing, my friend?” T’Challa looks at him, and Bruce feigns ignorance, not that the other man can’t see right through him. It isn’t that he doesn’t want to talk about therapy, more that he knows T’Challa will make him do whatever his therapist recommended, which is infinitely worse.

“How is counseling?” T’Challa pushes, his tone tells Bruce that he won’t be dropping the subject.

“Sanchez told me I should try some alternative mindfulness activities.” Bruce stabs another leaf, kicks at the fine carpet of T’Challa’s exquisitely decorated, 32nd floor office. Bruce would kill for a view like that. His office on campus is literally in the basement, for proximity to the lab, but still, windowless and lit primarily by hideous florescent lights. “Hobbies that relax me.”

“And what hobbies relax you, Bruce?” T’Challa’s fingers are tapping away at his keyboard.

“You already know, T’Challa. Fishing. Camping. Hiking.” Bruce lists easily. He hates the city, has for as long as he can remember. The smell of dirt and the feeling of clean air in his lungs. Dipping his toes in fresh water. There isn’t anything quite like it. The city is dusty, cruddy, and full of far too many people. T’Challa shares his general animosity toward crowds, which makes pretty much all of their conversations that much easier.

“I am guessing Dr. Sanchez more had in mind hobbies that do not require a weekend getaway?”

“Yeah.”

“Have you considered archery?”

“No, T’Challa, I have not considered archery.” Bruce sighs and cracks his neck. He supposes it isn’t the worst idea, but it isn’t as though he planned on taking Sanchez’s advice seriously anyway. He hadn’t had a blackout in more than six months, and just the thought of having a ‘hobby’ was stressful. But when T’Challa doesn’t press further, Bruce finds himself actually considering it. It could be fun, potentially, if he doesn’t accidentally shoot someone. His hand-eye coordination and aim have always been faulty, but imagining pulling back the bowstring and hitting the center of a target with a satisfying thunk. The prospect is exciting in an unfamiliar way that makes his wrists tingle from disuse.

“Why? Do you practice it?” Bruce raises an eyebrow. T’Challa grins, knowing he has Bruce hooked now. The scientist always forgets how sneaky his friend is like that, how he can map out a conversation before it begins without the other person ever knowing he planned every word, every thought, every decision.

“I sometimes partake. I find it is very effective in relieving stress.” T’Challa is still smiling, and Bruce thinks that it might look mischievous on anyone else, but T’Challa has a way of making every expression look like a sunny invitation. Even his voice makes Bruce think of warm blankets. “And, it could be a good way to meet new people.”

“This again?” Bruce groans, “T’Challa, I don’t want to date anyone.” The lie scratches his throat on the way out.

T’Challa plays defensive but can’t seem to shed his smile. “I did not say anything about dating. Did you hear me say anything about dating?” He looks around, asking an invisible audience.

“I heard you think it.” Bruce quips, and regarding it like a joke helps push away thoughts of Betty. Her frightened face, the tremble in her voice, her tears, the feeling of her father’s fists. He never wants to put anyone through that again, and he’s certainly not ready to risk it. Maybe in another seven years…

“I know that you are well, Bruce. I do not doubt that.” T’Challa looks more serious now, though the playful edge doesn't abandon his voice, even as his posture straightens. “But you know I worry that you go home alone every night.”

“I know.” Bruce won't even pretend to be annoyed at the concern. “I’m not the only single guy out there, T’Challa.”

“I am not just talking about an empty bed, Bruce. You sleep in an empty apartment.” The other man regards him with a fond sternness that Bruce has come to associate with his best friend.

He still shrugs it off, heavy as the comment falls on his shoulders. “So do you, T’Challa. Lots of people are happy living on their own.” He knows that isn’t what T’Challa means, that the number of occupants has nothing to do with how empty Bruce’s apartment is.

T’Challa nods slowly, swiveling his chair a few degrees back and forth. “Many people, yes. But not you.”

The truth stings his neck and makes his arms itchy, he feels verbal mosquitos biting at his elbows. T’Challa is still staring at him, serious, seemingly insouciant. The warm invitation lingers behind his lips, though. It always does, and it has a way of shattering Bruce’s barriers, because T’Challa has never had any difficulty walking through them anyway.

“Bruce."

“Fine, fine.” Bruce fixes the plastic lid over his half-eaten salad. “I’ll come over tonight.” There’s a comfortably pregnant pause before Bruce tries to open his mouth again, but T’Challa, as always, is faster.

“My friend, if I hear one word about not wanting to be an imposition, you and I will cross swords.”

Bruce laughs and recants his unspoken words, tucking them away to waste on someone else’s generosity. He’s lucky, so lucky, that T’Challa has the patience of an actual statue. A statue of a saint. Too often he has to remind himself that the other man likes having him around. Sometimes it's hard to fathom why, though the gorgeous CEO is all too willing to explain it to him, time and time again.

Bruce is smart. Bruce is kind. Bruce is patient. One attribute that he’s sensed T’Challa particularly favors is their shared propensity for silence. Bruce thinks he gets it from his regular seclusion in nature, away from (ugh) people. Not every silence needs to be filled. If something needs to be said or should be said, it will be said. Forcing a conversation diminishes its value, Bruce always reasons.

The silences between him and T’Challa are never awkward. They’re just another part of the conversation. Bruce ruminates on it as he makes his way out of the Vibrance Inc building, waving to the security guard on his way out. Sheila always has a smile for him.

—

“Bruce, did you take the stairs?” T’Challa looks Bruce up and down, sees his suppressed heaving and the drops of sweat that stubbornly stick and mat his skin and hair together.

“Exercise is good.” Bruce shrugs. On second thought, maybe eight flights of stairs was overkill.

T’Challa scoffs. “Indeed. For those who are well-nourished. You, on the other hand, are liable to collapse in on yourself if you do not gain some weight."

Bruce makes a noise of protest. It’s another thing that T’Challa justifiably gets on his case for. He’s a slip of a thing, he knows, but it isn’t like he starves himself. He eats when he’s hungry, which is not very often. And he likes pizza and meat and hearty, greasy foods, he does. He just likes salad more. 

“Meat lover’s pizza, Bruce. And I expect you to take home the leftovers.” T’Challa guides him inside, slipping the jacket from his shoulders. Bruce shifts the six pack from one hand to the other to shuck the smoothed brown sleeves. T'Challa treats it with care as he hangs it on the extravagant hatrack, as if it’s alive. Bruce’s skin is already itching with need, a want for tenderness. He’s jealous of the fucking jacket, Christ.

He toes off his shoes and rolls up his sleeves. Purely for utility, of course, and not so he can rub his arms for some kind of warm contact. His lips turn dry even as his mouth waters a bit, and not with hunger. He has some idea of what his friend might offer him tonight, but he never wants to assume.

“I’ll go for a slice.” Bruce concedes, stepping into the familiar penthouse kitchen. His friend is generous with his space, and Bruce suspects that, though he enjoys living on his own, T’Challa is a bit lonelier than he lets on, too. The scientist tries not to think about how much time he spends at the penthouse, selfishly ignores the occasional week that he spends more nights beneath T’Challa's 1000 thread count sheets than in his own bed. He can’t even blame himself for it. Those sheets cost more than his rent.

“You will ‘go’ for several.” T’Challa informs him. “I made breadsticks and marinara as well. I thought maybe we were going too soft on our intestines.”

Bruce lets out a hale, solitary laugh at that as he pops the cap off his beer. “Want one?” He asks, wiping the remnants of his first sip off his lips. The bottle lost its chill sometime during his tangle with the stairs, but is refreshing nonetheless.

“Please.”

Then comes the comfortable silence. It really was like a conversation. Sitting side by side on the couch, eating slice after slice. Bruce rolling his eyes whenever T’Challa plops another piece on his plate with a warning glance. Nice music in the background; they’ve both caught up on their news for the day, and Bruce isn’t the greatest sports fan while T’Challa can’t stand films, so the TV remains cozy and quiet in its cabinet.

Two beers. Three.

They both laugh when Bruce takes a generous bite of breadstick and makes a sour face for it. He was too scared to even try the homemade marinara. T’Challa is a man of endless talents. Bruce finds a certain and private smugness that baking isn’t one of them.

Cooking, on the other hand… well, the man’s guacamole is like an orgasm for the tongue.

—— 

When they first did this, Bruce didn’t drink. He wrung his hands and flinched at just about everything, scared to touch any of the expensive items for fear of sullying them. Fingerprints are a nightmare to get out. T’Challa chuckled at him again and again, urging him to sit down, to relax if he so wished, and to eat. T’Challa is always trying to get him to eat.

Eventually, Bruce became comfortable stepping on the soft carpeting and the smooth hardwood. He learned to enjoy the imported furniture that was far outside of his taste, and T’Challa’s pointedly non-American music. He became acquainted with the kitchen, sometimes even making a meal for the two of them. And T’Challa never told him he ‘didn’t have to do that’ because he knew Bruce already knew. He knew Bruce wanted to.

And one night at the penthouse, Bruce felt that familiar prickle at the back of his neck, the one he tries to forget so often. Too often. He felt his throat tighten and dry and his muscles tense. It was stupid. It was nothing. It had been a particularly crappy day and Bruce hadn’t done his breathing exercises, and T’Challa said one teasing thing, Bruce doesn’t even remember what but it had him seeing red. And then it had him seeing black.

He woke up on the couch, his hands bound together by silk rope, his ankles in a similar state. T’Challa was there with a glass of water and a smile. He didn’t ask any questions as he untied the miserable man. Just explained that Bruce fell into quite a state the night before, and that when it seemed he might hurt himself, T’Challa had the notion to restrain him.

He waved away Bruce’s teary, blubbering apology with awing placidity.

“A friend in need is not a burden.” He had said it with such sincerity and finality that Bruce let himself believe the other man.

The next night T’Challa invited him over, Bruce tempted fate with a beer. T’Challa seemed pleased and at ease, and the feeling was contagious. Bruce felt safe in an odd way, like for the first time in a long time, he wasn’t a danger to others, and he wasn’t a danger to himself.

T’Challa was, and still is… sculpted. Fit doesn’t do his body justice. The man has ridiculous strength, and even with adrenaline and rage pumping through his veins, Bruce is no match for his muscles. T’Challa could have him pinned and down for the count before Bruce could blink.

And that’s how Bruce knew he was safe.

That’s how one beer became two became three, until Bruce allowed himself a taste of the pleasures alcohol could offer.

And then, after even more time, Bruce allowed himself a taste of the pleasures T’Challa could offer.

——— 

Some hours later, lightly buzzed, the sun long asleep under the city skyline, they lean against one another. Bruce marvels at how comfortable he feels, here in belly of the city. Maybe it’s because the height of T’Challa’s penthouse lets him pretend he’s gazing at the sky from atop a mountain. Maybe it’s because he’s four beers in. Maybe it’s because T’Challa is there, warm and friendly with no ulterior motive, and Bruce wonders hopefully if making him happy is what makes T’Challa happy.

He isn’t precisely sure when they shed their shirts. He can’t even remember to care, because T’Challa’s skin feels fucking fantastic.

Bruce feels T’Challa’s arm snake around his neck, the accidental yet thrilling drag of his fingernails across his shoulder, and the not-so-accidental patterns that T’Challa traces into his skin. If Bruce closes his eyes and brushes away some of the fog around his mind, he can read the Wakandan glyphs his friend is writing into his pale shoulder. Nonsense, all random letters and words. But they feel nice. Things don’t always need to make sense to feel nice, T’Challa seems to be telling him.

Bruce lets his physical form melt away, it’s so much easier when he does. He’s putty, a puddle, in T’Challa’s arms. He welcomes the slow, firm tug into the other man’s chest, where every inch closer is an invitation to stay and permission to leave, and Bruce chooses to stay, every time.

Why would he leave?

T’Challa holds him. Bruce radiates the warmth of a sun, and T’Challa likes that. They enjoy each other’s smooth skin and T’Challa doesn’t mind the tickle of Bruce’s hairy chest against his bare one. He tucks Bruce’s head into the nook of his neck and lets Bruce breath him in and exhale onto his exposed skin. He draws more Wakandan glyphs into the expanse of Bruce’s back, traveling down at a leisurely pace, as though Bruce is a canvas or a page. He would not insult it by leaving even one inch blank.

Bruce contentedly mouths at T’Challa’s neck. It’s comfortable. It’s fuzzy, warm, and friendly, dragging his lips back and forth, scratching playfully at a line he doesn’t want to cross.

T’Challa doesn’t mind. T’Challa welcomes it. He makes an approving sound before lifting Bruce up effortlessly and walking him to the bedroom, then to the bed, then to beneath the sheets, where the touching continues.

No belts are unbuckled. They never are.

Their lips brush a few times, barely, chastely, unimportantly, as the hours pass and slumber seeps into their pores.

It is good, and it is enough. Even if Bruce doesn’t feel at home when he dozes off, curled against T’Challa’s left, it’s enough. It’s as close to home as he feels anywhere. It’s good.

And it’s enough.

————

Bruce wakes up happy, safe under T’Challa’s arm. His throat is unbearably dry, though, so it hurts to swallow, which is as good an excuse as any to force himself out of bed. The other man wakes while Bruce is adding mushrooms to his omelet. His smile is as bright as the rising sun through the east bay window. Bruce lets himself bask in the two lights, lets himself be content for a little while.

There’s no touching in the morning. Apart from a farewell hug, there never is, and that’s okay. The nights are enough.

T’Challa sends him off with an entire pizza they didn’t touch the night before, along with a promise to eat all of it, and Bruce makes a joke about him being the witch from Hansel and Gretel before making off to the garage. He takes the elevator this time.

It was a good night. The food was good, the company was good, the touch was good. It was a pleasant reminder that T’Challa is his friend, bordering on family, and that T’Challa wants to help him when he can.

But also a reminder that Bruce needs help. And that thought… it isn’t so good. It tugs at the bottom of his stomach, pulls his throat down into a pit beneath his feet. Drags his thoughts along with it. All the drive back to his apartment is a fight to keep his mind afloat, to keep breathing, to keep going.

“Fuck, Banner.” He deadpans into his visor mirror. The car behind him makes a racket when he doesn’t see the green light, and for some reason that alone makes him feel ten times worse.

His apartment is nice. It’s cozy. It has posters on the wall and nice furniture. A vase of lemons in the middle of the kitchen table, just for a splash of color. It’s a nice apartment. It’s empty. It’s empty.

Like Bruce.

He’s holding in something as he puts the pizza away, as he shucks his jacket and throws it over the couch, wanting to punish it. Wanting to punish himself for not treating it with the tender care T’Challa did last night. He’s holding it in as he scrubs crusted food off of dishes. He takes solace in knowing it isn’t anger. Rage doesn’t plague him in the way that it used to.

Then he toes off his shoes, and he’s walking on linoleum, not carpet or hardwood. That’s fine.

He falls into his sheets as if he didn’t just wake from an amazing night’s sleep, and cocoons himself in a suit of cotton armor. That’s fine, too. No complaints; they’re comfortable. Comfortable enough.

Enough.

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? The problem that’s so easy to forget when he’s with T’Challa or with Hank, or lecturing a class, or in the lab with Shuri, or when he’s reading headhunting emails from Tony Stark. That the happy parts of his life are there, and he relishes them, but they don’t really belong to him. Is he really only happy when he’s with other people? Part of him thinks that isn’t actually a problem… except that he can’t be around people all the time. It isn’t safe. He isn’t safe.

And it’s not enough. Maybe it’ll never be. And it isn’t fair.

He throws an arm over his eyes and breaths deep. “Fair is for suckers, Banner.” He exhales. “Could be worse.”

He jolts when his left ass cheek suddenly vibrates, scrambles to swipe his phone open.

My archery instructor is a good man, Faradei Woodhunter. He teaches at the KOY recreation center, and he offers private lessons. I’ll tell him to expect your call .

Another text arrives, moments later, a contact card. T’Challa really doesn’t quit. Bruce decides to add the contact. Can’t hurt, after all. And maybe he’ll actually give the guy a call; Faradei is a pretty cool name.

He doesn’t even think he cares, but he needs something to worry about, some benign anxiety he can use to justify cancelling his stupid appointment. Yesterday’s lunch call with T’Challa alleviated all of his concerns for his physical safety.

“Bruce, you are not going to shoot yourself in the foot with an arrow. No, you’re not going to shoot anyone else, either. No one is going to be standing behind the targets, Bruce.” The last one was a moot point regardless. It wasn’t like he expected to actually hit any of the targets.

Then the image flashes through his mind again. A sheen of sweat across his face. Arms tensed and ready. He draws back the bowstring, tugs the arrow comfortably between his practice-calloused fingers, and he lets it fly. He lets it soar. And no sound is more satisfying than the arrow hitting the center of that red and white target.

That’s what he wants. T’Challa, Hank, Shuri, Selvig, they’re always telling him to do what he wants. And Bruce doesn’t need to be told that all of them are smarter than he is. Intelligence doesn’t even factor into that calculation. Technically, even Tony Stark is telling him to do what he wants. 

Bruce knew he was grasping at straws from the start, but it still helps, having an out. Of course, using that out means he has to go work for Tony, which is impossibly worse than shooting his foot with an arrow. Although, when he thinks about it, if he shoots his foot with an arrow, he’d have an excuse not to go to Stark and not to do archery anymore.

He grimaces at the thought, digs his hands into his hair with sharp admonition. Breathes in deep just like he’s supposed to.

Self harm is bad, he reminds himself. He reminds himself that he doesn’t do that anymore. He doesn’t even consider it anymore. Not even as a joke. Cuts and bruises haunt the edges of his mind. He’s tempted to lift his pants sleeves, just to stare in shame at the dozen or so short, pale scars that litter his shins. His unexcited hands think better of it, move to pull on his jacket instead. He doesn’t need to hurt right now.

“Last chance, Banner.” He mumbles as he pulls on his sneakers, deftly lacing them up, he’s rewarded by two beautiful pairs of bunny ears. “You could stay at home and watch Firefly. You could.”

He keeps at it, his own voice the perfect distraction up until when he almost uses his house key on his car. “You could turn around right now, even.” He huffs under his breath. “Who the hell even does archery anymore? Stay at home and watch TV in your pajamas like a normal person.” He adjusts his rear view mirror on instinct, even though it’s already in the prime position, as always. He looks at his ever-tired eyes in the reflection and the sight tugs one end of his lips down.

He looks deceptively bored. His default expression. “Yeah, right.” Bruce smooths down his hair. It’s in desperate need of a trim. Last week he’d taken scissors to his own hair, and when he got to work later that day Shuri laughed so hard he had to help her off the floor. “When have you ever been normal, Banner? You don't even own pajamas.”

—

Turns out Clint Barton looks exactly like Bruce expected, minus the tuba. Tall, blond, a bit more than comfortably fit. Classically attractive. He has a pair of tattoos on his upper right arm, one on his left, and as soon as he sees Bruce scoping them out, the archery instructor grins and flexes to show them off.

First is a horned serpent coiled around the middle of the man’s bicep, curling back and forth upward in a triangle only for the head to jut out to the left at the top. Above the snake is some kind of abstract beast, the tattoo has clearly been redone at least once. Upon closer inspection Bruce determines it’s a galloping boar.

The left arm has a drawing of a ribbon, the word ’trick’ written in all capital letters and an arrow sticking through either end.

Only the snake looks like a professional tattoo, being the only of the three with well-defined lines and color, but Bruce has the feeling they all have some significance. He’s soon distracted by Clint shooting several arrows in quick succession, Bruce can barely track his movement. The archer has been busy; each aligned target stretching across the range bears a letter, traced in neatly arranged arrows.

B-A-R-T-O

Bruce figures he’s working on the N, finding himself rather distracted by the sheer awe he’s in, because no one can possibly be that good of an archer.

This man could kill me. Bruce thinks curiously. He could shoot me right now. The thought isn’t nearly as scary as it should be, more intriguing than anything else.

“I was hoping to finish before you got here.” Clint huffs, his muscles ripple and flex as he lets loose another arrow. “But, you know how it goes.” Bruce really does not know how it goes.

“That’s… really impressive.” Bruce wants to say something else, wants to add some actual expression to his throaty voice. Odd, considering he hasn’t had that urge since he first met Erik Selvig. He was on the astrophysicist’s welcome committee and wanted to make a good impression, winning him over by introducing the man to authentic New York bagels.

Clint beams at him, exuding pure smugness. He knows he’s good, that much is clear. He knows exactly how good he is, and he soaks up every compliment he can get. “This is nothing.” He grins. “I’m working on my self-portrait, if you want to see impressive.”

Bruce can’t tell if he’s joking or not and he’s too bewildered to ask.

“Did you get here alright?” Clint shoots his last arrow, spelling out BARTON with better penmanship (arrowman-ship?) than Bruce can manage with his own hands, he walks over to retrieve the arrows as if he didn’t just perform a minor miracle.

Bruce dumbly nods a lie. Getting to the range was a nightmare. Luckily, Bruce likes to be early to things, a habit he learned from Betty, who regularly expected traffic to be twice as bad than it ever was, so the gridlock on the way there didn’t cut into his appointment. But then when he rushed into the building, cheeks flushed from his parking lot jog, someone was already at the reception counter, and Bruce is patient, but he’s not that patient, because the receptionist and whoever he’s talking to apparently knew each other, so he tried his luck just walking around.

He was successful in finding the pool, the basketball court, and the tennis and table-tennis courts, as well as a budding frustration, before a passing soccer coach directed him, with a completely unnecessary eye roll, to the archery range.

But he’s here now, in any case. Here with Clint, who is expectedly and unexpectedly gorgeous. The very thought startles Bruce. He doesn’t think that kind of thing about people. He can recognize an attractive body any day of the week, but he’s always felt a distinct difference between seeing it and feeling it. The last time he was really attracted to someone was Betty, and even then he knew her for a good while before he started to feel toward her.

Before that, there had been a boy in high school. Jerome. Bruce remembers having to adjust his jeans the first time he laid eyes on the other boy, though he’d always attributed that to being a teenager. An awkward teenager. And in high school. He got an erection watching a documentary on birds, his lips got dry looking at Monet paintings- he didn’t think much of it.

But this man, Clint, has him feeling strange. It's a vaguely familiar feeling, though he can’t remember what to call it.

Then Clint is snapping his fingers inches from his face, shocking him hard enough that he forgets to be offended. “Hello?” Clint singsongs. “You are Bruce Banner, right?” His arms are full of the arrows collected from the targets. 

“Yeah, that’s me.” Bruce’s voice sounds like a shrug.

“Sweet.” He feels Clint’s eyes scanning him up and down, like a high-tech body scanner from a sci-fi movie, except it gives him chills. Seriously, what is-

“I’ve never done archery before.” Bruce clears his throat, trailing after Clint as he makes his way to an office that stands opposite the targets.

“Yeah, me neither.” Clint sighs. “Just started today.”

Bruce scrunches his face a bit at that, even when the other man turns around and laughs.

“I’m kidding. It’s a joke.”

“Yeah.” Bruce shoves his hands in his hoodie pocket. His indifference just elicits another chuckle. Bruce freezes when Clint abruptly and forcibly grabs his forearm, sliding up the blue sleeve so he can wrap his fingers tightly around the scientist’s slender limb, considering, analyzing. And then, for a moment, a warmth emanates from him, and Bruce feels like even if the touch were invited, it lingered for too long.

“Here, I think this is your size.” Clint is already rummaging through a box in the closet to the far side of the room. He emerges victoriously with an arm brace.

“What’s that for?” Bruce is gripping the end of his sleeve at the wrist like it’s going to fly off. He’s trying not to rub the tingling skin that was in Clint’s calloused grip. Trying so hard not to check to see if there’s a red handprint left in its wake. Why does he even care?

Clint eyes the brace inquisitively. “Not actually sure.” He pokes at its components, fiddles with a strap before wiggling his fingers playfully through a sleeve that’s much too small for him. His face breaks out in a toothy smile. “I’m kidding. Jeez. It’s so your arm doesn’t get hurt. Keeps everything secure. Don’t want you straining a muscle.”

“You weren’t wearing one.” Bruce is vaguely suspicious, but it has more to do with the blond man’s erratic behavior than any equipment.

Clint snorts. “I’ve also been doing this since I was seven.”

A rare, public smile possesses Bruce’s lips. “I thought you only started today.” He blurts out.

And now he wants to staple his mouth shut, if only Clint weren’t beaming at him like he’s a unicorn sliding down a rainbow. “Now you’re getting it.” He glees. “Here, take off your jacket.”

Bruce’s smile vanishes and his arms withdraw, fumbling back into his pockets. “Why?” He says warily. “I’d prefer to keep it on.”

“For the brace.” Clint points vaguely at the pice of equipment in his hand, his face just a bit lost, like he doesn’t know what expression he should make. “But uh- I guess you can keep it on. Can I see your arm?”

Bruce yields his right arm, if only because Clint actually asked this time, rolling up his sleeve meticulously while the archery instructor slides the neon green brace onto him.

“Is that too tight? It’s supposed to be tight, but not like, cut off your circulation or anything.” Clint tugs a bit more at the straps.

“It’s fine.” Bruce mumbles.

“Radical.” Bruce wonders if the man is capable of saying anything without smiling maniacally. Before he knows it he’s being dragged back out of the office and shoved onto a large black circle that stands parallel to the closest target.

“Do you want the bullseyes or the silhouettes?” Clint asks, unfazed by Bruce’s questioning look. “For targets. Some people have a preference. Also some people get really wigged out by the silhouettes.”

Bruce notes that he definitely belongs in the category of ’some people’. “Bullseyes are good.” In his archery fantasy, he’s hitting the middle of a bullseye anyway. Speaking of, there’s a bow in his hands now.

“Classic. I like it.” Clint is suddenly crowding his space, chuckling far more quietly than before. It makes the moment uncomfortably intimate. “No, no, you hold it like this. No, with your dominant hand. Yeah.” Bruce is getting more and more heated the longer Clint stands close to him, he tries to accommodate the archer’s instructions while also pulling away from his large, muscular body, and at the same time trying not to make it clear he’s doing so. God, he’s worse than Pym.

“Grip it tighter. Wizard, you got it Brucey.” Clint says proudly. Bruce is pretty sure he was already blushing. When did Clint give him an arrow? “So, first look at the target, then you gotta fix your feet.” Clint kicks Bruce’s feet apart, positioning them vertical to one another. “Good enough. You want to fully align yourself with the target. All you have to do is aim and let go, the bow does all the hard work for you. Aim with both eyes.”

Bruce is scarcely listening to the other man, too focused on regulating his breathing. Bruce has to remind himself that this is Clint’s job, that his personal space is not being selectively violated by this stunningly attractive, sweet-faced, painfully annoying adonis. But then…

If Clint was leaning in too close before, it’s too too close now. He’s not instructing anymore, no authority in his tone. He’s whispering in Bruce’s ear, breath hot against his skin, he can feel the condensation gathering.

“Lift your arm a bit. Like that, good. Not so tense. Remember to relax.” Bruce tenses even more at that; it doesn’t sound like he’s talking about archery anymore. Delusional. Delusional Bruce.

And his fingers are sliding up the exposed skin of Bruce’s arm, pointedly avoiding the brace to grip the skin, the bare skin, Bruce’s skin. Slowly. “A little bit higher. You’re doing great.”

Great? Bruce sweats. He hasn’t even shot an arrow yet.

The brown-haired man feels himself dissociate, leave his body to retreat into his anxiety in the usual manner, slipping between moments. The last person, the only person, who has touched him this much for this long is T’Challa. No one else even comes close. He gets bi-weekly hugs from Shuri, fist bumps and playful shoves from Hank, and once in a blue moon, a handshake from Selvig. And even then, he knows all four of them. He knows them all well. T’Challa is his best friend, and there is an unspoken yet indisputable understanding that everything they do is platonic. Aside from the first few times Bruce cuddled with the CEO, desperate and touch starved, he’d never even gotten hard from it. He can’t imagine why-

Brought back to his own body, the panicked realization jerks him away from Clint, miles away from Clint. He can’t care about how it must look, he just needs to get away from the other man. Or everyone. Maybe leave the planet, if that’s an option.

Clint’s hands are up innocuously, though he tries to follow Bruce, who only just realizes he fell. “Hey, man, are you- are you okay? What happened?” He carefully steps over the discarded bow. 

“I have to leave.” Bruce’s voice is still measured and tame, standing in utter opposition to his every other action. “I’m going to go now. Sorry.”

“Are-“ Clint frowns and clenches his hands in distress. “Why are you crying? Did I hurt you?”

“No.” Bruce deadpans, tugging at the brace on his arm, his entire body flinches when Clint reaches over to assist him. He manages to wrestle it off and apologetically places it on the floor, keeping his eyes on the distraught archer while he pulls himself to his feet.

“Bruce, are you okay? I didn’t-“

“I’m going now.” Bruce grunts with all much finality he can muster. His hands find his hoodie pocket once more, he turns on his heels and darts to the door.

Bruce dashes for the first lit exit sign he sees, following it down several flights of stairs, letting his legs do the work while he holds his mind together with his hands, tightly gripping the sides of his head. He vaguely hopes the door he’s using isn’t an emergency exit before he shoves through it, letting fresh air flood his lungs and sunshine burn his eyes. It’s good. It’s different.

But then he looks down, wills the blurriness from his sight and grimaces at his straining jeans.

He should’ve just gone camping.

——

Bruce manages to pull himself out of his bed the next day when he gets a call from Hank telling him his Thai food is getting cold.

“Where are you?” Hank demands crossly. “It’s Saw 3 tonight. I’m not watching it alone.” 

Bruce stops at Giant on his way to Hank’s to buy some mint chocolate chip. He leaves with two cartons, though, because you really can’t beat a two for one sale.

———

“That’s just blasphemous.” Bruce groans from Hank’s couch. “Did the ice cream hurt you in a past life or something?”

“Okay, first of all, ice cream soup is hedonistic at worst, and absolutely delicious on a bad day.” Hank sets 30 seconds into his outdated microwave. It operates on a dial instead of buttons, but the dial came off some time ago, and the company doesn’t make his model anymore, so he uses a pair of pliers to turn it instead.

“Melting ice cream on purpose should be a criminal offense.” Bruce snarks.

“And second of all.” Hank shouts. “You’re deflecting.”

Bruce groans. “No, no, no, Hank. Is the psychology department getting to you again?”

“Bruce! Focus!”

“I keep telling you they’re a bad influence.” Bruce jabs his spoon toward his fellow scientist. He feels relaxed, natural. A slight smile on his face, voice firm to match his settled mind. “They lure you in with the neuroscience, and then before you know it they’re shoving Freud down your throat and you’re in a shrink’s office snorting cocaine off the carpet."

“Come on, Bruce, I’m serious. You can’t just not talk about it.” Hank pleads. He yanks open the microwave one second before it bellows out its ear-piercing screech.

“Alright, alright.” Bruce concedes. He does want to talk about the archery range. Truly, he does. It’s just uncomfortable, and fucking with Hank Pym is very very fun. “I just feel weird about it. I don’t usually… react like that. Ever.”

“You mean going berserk and running out of a building? Or do you mean-“ Hank gestures crudely to his crotch. “The other thing? Because I’ve seen you do the first thing at least twice.”

“That’s different.” Bruce sets his bowl down on the coffee table, quickly shoving a coaster under it when Hank glares daggers at him. “This wasn’t an episode. And I’ve never gotten an erection in public before.”

Hank flushes red at that, to Bruce’s amusement.

“Never?” Hank tugs at his shirt collar, practically making a show of avoiding Bruce’s eyes while the brunette nods his affirmation. “What about on Wednesday?”

“What about it?”

“You know, when the dancer came to your office?” Hank presses, looking as intrigued as he does uncomfortable.

“Dancer… you mean the stripper?” Bruce cocks his head, hands clasped together in his lap. “No. That didn’t affect me at all, actually.”

Hank looks incredulous. “She was a very attractive woman.”

“I didn’t get an erection, Hank.”

He flushes red again and looks away, and Bruce figures that his friend probably did react to Dr. Sugar. “But you did at the archery range?”

“Eat your ice cream soup.”

“It needs to cool down.” Hank says informatively. He makes his way back toward the couch with his demonic creation steaming lightly in a red ceramic bowl. “Honestly, Bruce, you’re thinking about this all wrong.”

“How so?” Bruce leans forward and inspects the various black containers. He picks up the remains of the drunken noodles to dump them in with the last of the brown rice.

“You have a crush, Bruce.”

Bruce stares at his friend, wide-eyed, fingers twitching.

“What? You do! Even without the…” Hank blushes yet again and clears his throat, waving his hand toward Bruce’s thighs. “That. It’s obvious by the way you talked about him. You said he looked like a marble statue. I think it’s great, Bruce. I’ve never heard you talk about anyone like that."

That puts a smile on Bruce’s face, and not just because of the endearing sentiment.

He and Hank have never talked about Bruce’s non-heterosexuality. It was never relevant, and the other man didn’t even blink when Bruce described the obnoxious, undeniably attractive, archery instructor. Bruce knows Hank had no idea before, either. The man has as much gaydar as he has game; the older man recounted that he had a brief, pleasant, and confusing conversation with ‘Dr. Sugar,’ who notably did not have an MD, failing to realize she was a stripper until the woman said as much. Bruce snickered imagining it. The moment she started disrobing, Hank had probably averted his eyes with a violent blush, sputtering apologies and asking why she was undressing.

Hank even called her an exotic dancer when he chewed out Bruce for leaving him to deal with her. The man was so pure it almost made Bruce sick.

“Never change, Pym.” Bruce elbows his friend in the ribs.

Henry protests the contact but radiates solar flares with his smile. The man’s smile could power the entire city for a week. “Thanks! I don’t plan on it. So are you going back next Saturday?"

Bruce knows what it looks like when T’Challa is hiding a smile. He’s been in the man’s good graces and constant company enough to identify the subtle twinkle in his eye, the way that the very ends of his lips hover up and down. The scientist isn’t fooled when T’Challa brings clasped hands in front of his mouth with faux-curious eyes.

“Interesting.” He says. Bullshit.

“You know Clint, don’t you?” Bruce accuses, stabs a cube of tofu from his container of peanut noodles. He got a broccoli on his fork, too. Nice.

“I have met him on occasion.” The man turns back to his computer.

“Uh-huh.” Suspicion and vague irritation make his fingertips tingle. His sneaking suspicion that T’Challa set him up to meet Clint has turned into a gnawing intuition. T’Challa couldn’t have known that Bruce would set a lesson the weekend Faradei was out of town. Right? Not that it would have mattered; Clint is the only other archery instructor at the rec center. He would have been there either way.

T’Challa seems content to move the conversation right along, though. “I agree with Dr. Pym’s diagnosis,” He ignores Bruce’s mumbled ’not that kind of doctor’, “You have. A crush.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Bruce dismisses. He isn’t done talking about it, but he also doesn’t like where his friend is directing the conversation. He silently curses T’Challa’s conversational superpowers.

“Why not?” He doesn’t even pause for Bruce to shrug. "This is healthy, Bruce. Natural. When is the last time you had a crush?”

Bruce ponders on that, stirs his noodles about. “You.” He says decisively through a mouthful of noodles.

T’Challa shakes his head. “That was touch-starvation, Bruce, not infatuation.” Fair enough.

“Okay. Then Betty, I guess.” Stab stab stab.

“So, this would be your first infatuation in eleven years, then?” T’Challa sounds so unfairly superior, like he knows more than Bruce. To his credit, he probably does know more than Bruce. 

“Mm-hm.” Bruce nods shortly.

“Your first and only crush in more than a decade.”

“Mm-hm.” He hums louder.

“Then you must act on it.” T’Challa urges.

“Must.” Bruce chuckle-mutters. “There’s nothing to act on, T’Challa. First of all, it was a completely involuntary reaction. It happened because of the situation, not the person.” T’Challa raises a disbelieving eyebrow, and Bruce’s throat tickles. Damn it.

“Second of all,” Bruce absently scratches at his neck. “Even if we assume I am attracted to him, there’s no evidence that it's reciprocal.”

“I hardly see how that matters.” T’Challa smooths out his voice so that it sounds like music.

“It’s the only thing that matters!” Bruce says incredulously. “He’s probably not even into men."

T’Challa makes a low, doubtful sound. “If I might ask, did you inquire toward’s Elizabeth's sexuality before you asked her out?”

“Bold of you to assume that I asked first, but no.” Bruce hopes he doesn’t sound as wary and he feels. As socially inept as he often feels, even Bruce knows you don’t ask someone out by asking if they’re a lesbian.

“And did you ask if she was attracted to you before you expressed your interest?” T’Challa sounds victorious.

“No.” Bruce answers mere seconds before he connects the dots. “Oh. I see what you did there.”

“Then I hardly see how the situation differs.” T’Challa says smugly. “And it was not boldness, my friend. You have told me how you met her, and how you made a fool of yourself when you asked her on a date.” The memory of walking directly into a tree flashes before Bruce’s eyes.

“Doesn’t matter.” Bruce waves a hand through the air, as if brushing aside everything that’s been said. “This isn’t a, isn’t a thing, alright? Crush or no, I’m not- it doesn’t- I don’t think-“ Bruce grunts and huffs in frustration, tangling up his own words. “Can we talk about something else?"

“You are a good man, Bruce. You should have good things.”

The scientist rolls his eyes, too used to hearing this tune. “Let’s not get into what I deserve, T’Challa, no one is entitled to a romantic relationship. Or a date. Or whatever.” Bruce bites his tongue to keep the rambling at bay.

T’Challa just shakes his head. “I’m not talking about deserving or entitlement, my friend. I’m not even talking about romance. I’m talking about you. You should have something good, Bruce. Let yourself have something. Someone. Let someone in. It does not have to be Barton. But you should let someone, or something, in. You must.”

“You know why I can’t do that, T’Challa.” Bruce bites out. He has T’Challa, he has Hank, he has Shuri. He doesn’t want anyone else. He doesn’t get another word in before his friend is on him again.

“Omitting the fact that you have gone eleven months without an episode,” T’Challa walks toward him, steps into his bubble without popping it, inches away and somehow not invading his space. “You are acting very selfishly, Bruce Banner.”

Bruce almost fumes at that, huffs the anger out in the form of a cough before meeting T’Challa’s eyes sternly. “Excuse me?”

“I think you spend too much time in your own head, Bruce.” T’Challa utters smoothly, his gaze carving through Bruce like butter. “Your concern for the safety of others is understandable. But, at a certain point, that concern became arrogance. Arrogance that you have mistaken for altruism.”

Bruce stands up, haphazardly scooting his chair back to make room once he realizes T’Challa won’t be yielding an inch of ground. “I appreciate your input, T’Challa, but if I wanted to hear about how I’m deluding myself, I’d talk to Sanchez.”

“So you say, yet you came here for counsel.”

“I came here for lunch.” Bruce deadpans.

T’Challa hums in acknowledgement, staring the brunette down with glacial calm compared to Bruce’s candle of annoyance. The scientist scoffs softly and goes about packing his things.

“In your 'selfless' plight to protect others from your rage, you push people and opportunities away.” T’Challa cocks his head, rears his voice to strike a finishing blow. "It is time to ask yourself if others need your protection.”

“They do.” Bruce says blandly. He shoves the plasticware in his lunchbag too quickly and snaps the spoon in two.

“Maybe.” T’Challa sighs doubtfully. He picks up the wastebasket by his desk and holds it out for Bruce. “Still, I think that decision is better left to the individual. It is not your place to decide for everyone, Bruce."

Bruce feels his eyes start to water. Feels weakness seeping in, and he can’t have that. He swallows and swallows, thinks about pickles to salivate so he can swallow some more, forcing down the lump in his throat.

“Yours is one of the greatest minds and the kindest souls of our generation.” T’Challa declares. His tone is kind, but inarguable. “I know you think that you are protecting the world from your anger by detaching yourself from society. As said, perhaps that is true. But I think…” He waits until he knows he has Bruce’s full attention; their eyes don’t meet, but the scientist stills, hand buried in his satchel. “I think you are depriving the world of everything you have to offer."

And Bruce… has never thought about it that way. Every time he thinks about opening up, visions of Betty threaten to crack his skull from the inside out; he sees her with a black eye, then two. Then in a hospital bed.

Soon Bruce finds himself in a hallway, white and sterile-smelling. He walks along, away from the first room, with Betty in it. All through the hall, he hears heart monitors. He lurches when he hazards a glance into the second room, where Shuri is bandaged from head to toe. Then he’s in front of the third room, never having taken a step, where Hank Pym is in a similar state, awake and staring at Bruce in utter terror, his monitor is beeping faster and faster.

He stalks out of T’Challa’s office with an empty goodbye, though in his mind he still walks the halls of the hospital. He on the other side of the hallway now. Each room is filled with a new, unfamiliar face. Shuri is in every room, looking the perfect picture of health, wearing a smile so wide it barely fits her face.

“Dr. Banner, it worked!” She squeals in delight each time, and with each room, the faceless patient looks a bit healthier, and then healthier still. “Bruce, we did it!”

Her smile is contagious. He wants to ask 'what? What worked?' But he can’t make the words, nor does it matter.

His science… 

Maybe T’Challa is right. Minus the maybe. T’Challa is right. But Bruce isn’t sure it makes a difference.

Even if Bruce is being selfish, keeping himself isolated from all but a few, it isn’t as though he’s brave enough to do anything about it.

He’s so lost in his head, he doesn’t even send Sheila a smile on his way out.

—

Bruce manages to steady himself by the time he gets back to Asgard, but T’Challa’s sentiments weigh down his feet. He feels like he’s breaking the asphalt path, like he’s leaving behind footprints in snow. The thought, the sensation, is a little too satisfying for his comfort.

Shuri is uncharacteristically calm, which also helps; she meets him in his office, nods a hello and hands him today’s binder, filled with her color-coded notes. He flips through them, pen-marking his lecture accordingly, he waits for her to make some snappy remark or ask about the lab. She doesn’t, which is weird. He’s as thankful as he isn’t; some normalcy might ground him right now, even if the quiet before talking in front of almost two dozen people is much-needed.

Weird. It’s weird, to the point that Bruce forgets his agitation toward the ugly ugly lights that hover over them like little bursts of electricity that weren’t cut out to be lightning, and they’re mad about it.

In the middle of lecture, Bruce notices something is… off. Not actually off, more like not all the way on. He doesn’t let it bother him, doesn’t miss a beat talking about irregular cell replication. He glances at his TA; Shuri is at her desk, and she’s...

She’s on her phone.

There are a few things abjectly wrong about the situation, the first being that Shuri clings to Bruce’s every word like it’s gospel. Bruce just assumed that Shuri’s phone fell out of existence for the duration of class. The second is that Shuri’s inattention isn’t what’s bothering him. It is now, for sure, but it wasn’t the cause of the initial feeling. He feels like he’s being watched.

He is being watched. He’s being watched and listened to by twenty three of the college’s nerdiest undergrad students. Twenty-three students. And one archer.

Over the years, Bruce has located, modified, and unequivocally perfected his brain’s pause button. He feels the deja vu as he slips between moments, the same way he did the last time he saw Clint Barton, archer extraordinaire. So the moment he sets eyes on the blond drink of water sitting in the back row of cheap, worn down seats, his brain lunges for the button and presses it frantically.

What the hell is Clint Barton doing in his classroom? What the fuck is Clint Barton doing at Asgard U? Bruce supposes he could be a student, obviously not in his class, but he looks about the same age as Bruce’s grad students. Not that Bruce has ever been any good at telling people’s ages. Age aside, an insistent tug at Bruce’s gut tells him that Clint is not a student. No way.

He feels just a little guilty at the implications attached to his intuition, but he reserves that to think about after there isn’t an unwelcome presence in his sanctuary of learning. Because that’s what this room is to him. His place. His palace. This is a place that Bruce can feel and maintain complete control. He has mastery here; he controls the flow of knowledge from teacher to student, he commands attention. His emotions are happily shackled by his responsibilities in this room. He is in control.

And, he realizes just as his brain pause expires, just the sight of this man he barely knows makes the ground beneath him wet and muddy, and he feels his foot slipping, not slowly, out of control. He can feel himself slipping, and it’s dangerous. That means that Clint Barton is dangerous.

——

Bruce muddles through the rest of class, a mindless feat; he could recite that lecture in his sleep, though he’ll get an earful from Shuri for not implementing her changes. That’s fine though. He can deal with Shuri. He knows how to deal with Shuri.

Clint, not so much. Clint just spent the duration of class watching Bruce, which shouldn’t be unsettling whatsoever, since all of his students were doing the exact same thing. The students at least glanced away to take notes. No such luck with Clint, whose eyes made it very clear that he was looking at the professor, not listening to him.

And when Clint approaches Bruce after class, Bruce’s skin doesn’t itch, exactly, as the archer strides down the steps like they belong to him, it feels out of place. Like even though it looks like he’s here, his body should be somewhere different. Bruce only fleetingly considers how odd it is that no student came to talk to him after he dismissed them, even if he went a few minutes overtime. That’s never happened before. His students always have questions, comments, ideas. Did he tell them not to stay? Bruce’s mind fuzzes over the feeling that he saw Shuri usher them all out in a hurry.

“Howdy!” Bruce jumps, literally jumps, at Clint’s explosive salutation. Bruce grabs the front of his hoodie and tugs, hits his chest lightly a few times like he’s smacking his heart and lungs, ordering them to calm down. He doesn’t miss how Clint frowns for a split second and taps his ears.

“Bruce Banner.” Clint’s voice pervades the room, not echoing, just filling it up. “Nice, uh, talk. You used a lot of words that I don’t know at all.”

Bruce doesn’t laugh, but he does manage to thaw himself out. His mouth, at least. Didn’t even realize he was frozen. “Hello. Thanks. What are you doing here?” He can sense Shuri’s presence somewhere near the door, apparently he’s not thawed out enough to turn and look, but he can tell, just tell, she’s snickering at each nervous, clunky word. Brat.

Clint nods toward Shuri. “Sherri said I could wait in here until you were done.”

“Shuri.” Bruce corrects. “And okay. But what are you doing here? Why are you here?"

Bruce knows he sounds irritated. Mostly because he is, but maybe Clint can’t hear it, since no emotion thus far has any significant impact on his tone. He can’t shake the feeling that Clint is reading him, taking his words for how Bruce means them, not how they sound. It’s nearly the same sensation he got at the recreation center when the archer all but gave him a full body scan. Not as invasive this time, though. Not unexpected this time, either.

“I came to apologize.” Clint says, letting his sincerity wash over Bruce before continuing. “I know I did… something at our appointment. I’m not totally sure what, but I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to freak you out.” Clint shoves his hands into his jeans pockets. Bruce realizes that he’s dressed differently. It was silly of him to assume that his outfit at the gym was also his casual attire, but Clint looks equally gorgeous in both. Oh jeez.

“If you want, I can schedule another lesson for you. Free of charge, of course.” He smiles hopefully.

“That’s fine. I don’t think archery is for me.” Bruce says, and he relaxes into the truth he didn’t know was behind the statement.

“Alright.” Clint cocks his head, playfulness dances across his lips. Then his tongue does the same. “How about I make it up to you with a date?"

Bruce thinks Shuri might have hit him in the head with a baseball bat. “Excuse me?”

“A date.” Clint repeats cheerfully. “Let me take you out, make Saturday up to you.”

He can’t be serious. How he can follow up an apology for overstepping his bounds by overstepping them much, much further is beyond Bruce. What’s more beyond the scientist is why he doesn’t immediately say no. Why he doesn’t want to.

“How did you know I’d be here?” Bruce figures it’s as good a thing to say as any.

“Oh, dude, you’re like, super famous!” Clint’s eyes are sparkling with excitement. He bounces on his heels. Giddy. He looks giddy. “This is going to sound stalkery, I know, but I felt really bad after Saturday. I was gonna call you, but looking at client info is super against the rules.” He rolls his eyes. “So I just googled your name for the hell of it. Man, so much stuff came up. You’re like, some kind of science legend. Anyway, it wasn’t hard to find out you work here. This place really likes to brag about you.”

Bruce scoffs, mutters before he can stop himself about how they don’t fund shit. It’s true that Asgard loves to hype up that the one and only Bruce Banner works at their institution. They dress him up for every fundraising event and then some. Doesn’t stop them from whining about empty pockets whenever Bruce proposes a new study.

“I swear I’m not a creeper.” Clint shifts his weight back and forth. His initial bravado has diminished, but it’s still there. It’s still loud. “So, how about it? That date?” He adds when Bruce raises an eyebrow.

Again, instead of saying no, Bruce says something else. Something he shouldn’t say to someone as dangerous to him as Clint might be.

“When?” When?!?!

And Clint thinks that Bruce means yes, and the man in question instantly realizes his mistake.

“I was thinking Friday. Are you free Friday?”

Some not so distant part of Bruce is tempted to say yes. Not to Friday, but to a date, at some point, maybe not Friday. But the opportunity is too golden. He can say no, he isn’t free Friday, which would be true, and Clint might take the hint and not ask again.

“You are in luck, mister.” Shuri sidles up next to Bruce like it’s exactly where she belongs, inserting herself into the conversation like she was always there. “Bruce cancelled his classes Friday for an appointment that got called off. He’s free the entire day.”

Bruce looks sharply at Shuri, oh no the fuck she didn’t!

Clint flashes his pearly-whites, “Wizard! Here, give me your phone, I’ll put my number in it."

“Actually, no, I have to-“ Bruce looks desperately for the rewind button on this conversation until Shuri shoves her phone in his face. He barely has time to read the email she composed to all of his students before she presses send.

“Too late.” She whispers giddily. 

“Whyyyyyy-“ Bruce growls. Then Clint catches his eye again, the archer looking between Shuri and Bruce with raised eyebrows. ”-don’t I show you to the parking lot, Mr. Barton?” Lame recovery. It seems to do the job, though. “Unless you have some other business on campus.” The remark sounds far more pointed than Bruce intended, yet it still feels unfortunate that Clint doesn’t notice.

“Mr. Barton?” Clint grimaces like the words leave a rotten taste in his mouth. “Blegh. I don’t like that. Call me Clint. Or Hawkeye, you can call me Hawkeye if you want.” He jabs a proud thumb into his chest.

“Okay, Clint. Actually, can you step outside for a moment? I need to speak with my TA. We can talk in a minute?” He wraps an arm around Shuri and pulls her shoulder flush against his own, a little too tightly.

Clint gives a two finger salute, pops his lips, and shimmies out the door.

Bruce releases Shuri and buries his face in his hands and groans. He pulls one aside to shoo her away. He needs room to breathe because what the fuck!

“He is handsome, Dr. Banner.” Shuri bubbles.

“Shuri, you can’t just cancel classes.” Bruce’s voice is muffled between his fingers. “Why did you- you don’t even know him, Shuri. He could be a headhunter, or a serial killer.” He forgoes the extremity of variance between the two possibilities he's mustered in favor of staring down the junior scientist.

Shuri just looks at her feet, shuffling nervously. She shakes a foot, white sandal flopping back and forth.

“You’re kidding.” Bruce looks right at her, embarrassment abandoned for utter disbelief. Shuri suppresses a grin. “You can’t be serious. You and T’Challa. You and T’Challa.” Shuri can’t contain her mischievous giggle, and if Bruce didn’t feel sure before, he does now.

“Aaaaaah.” Bruce grips his hair, grounds himself with the strain and wonders if Hank is on this, too. “All of you, can you all just leave me… why?” Logically, he knows that they care. They all care. They’re persistent and annoying and right, all because they care. Even so, Bruce is a big boy. He doesn’t need them taking care of him. That thought makes his throat tickle.

He definitely does not need them setting up dates for him. That thought just makes his throat itch.

Shuri looks at him like he’s stupid, like she can’t believe that she’s working under this oblivious fool, though to be fair, Bruce can’t believe it either. “Dr. Banner.” She says, eyes wide. “He is very, very handsome.” She hesitates before boldly adding. “My brother said to tell you that when someone acts outside of their best interests, certain decisions must be made for them."

Bruce blinks at her. Once. Twice. “You’re fired.”

Her outraged shriek was likely heard on the other side of campus.

———

“Here, I’ll give you my number.” Clint bounces on his heels as soon as Bruce steps out of the classroom. Danger bells are going off in Bruce’s head. Not about Clint himself, he senses no ill will from the younger man. Clint is younger than him, he hasn’t realized before. He looks to be in his twenties. He feels suddenly conscious of his age. Thirty-two isn’t that old. Thirty-two with seven PhDs isn’t old at all.

He’s more scared about putting Clint in danger than the other way around. Even now, he feels his control wavering. Little tremors, nothing major. It’s still more than he’s experienced since his last episode, and any amount is dangerous.

Clint isn’t safe around him.

“He should be the one to decide that.”

T’Challa’s voice is so vivid, so clear, so close that Bruce whips his head around, eyes wide and ready to be shocked at the presence of his friend. But there’s no one there. Just him and Clint. Shuri is still pouting in the classroom. Only Shuri would pout over having work taken away.

Maybe he should be the one to decide that. Maybe Clint should decide. Not Bruce.

Clint plucks his phone from Bruce’s hand. The scientist doesn’t know when it got there, but Clint looks giddy again, so Bruce guesses he gave Clint his number. He receives a confirming text moments later.

Huh. That… wasn’t so bad. No crushing weight of anxiety falls on his shoulders, no wave of regret sucks him to the depths of the ocean. He feels unnervingly neutral about the entire situation. When was the last time he gave his number to someone. Not counting his number on class syllabi, or any other sort of official capacity, he thinks Erik Selvig was the last recipient. And that would have been almost three years ago.

Maybe that’s just what it feels like to give your number to someone. Exceeding amounts of normalcy, a dash of excitement, and a phantom aftertaste of indifference.

“Rad.” Clint squeaks, mostly to himself. Bruce can hardly keep from laughing, the other man acting like it’s Christmas morning.

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.” Bruce chuckles, face falling when Clint gapes at him. “Oh, no, not like that. I just meant I’m going to walk you to the visitor parking lot.”

Clint wipes away his flash of confusion. “Yeah, yeah.”

The don’t even make it out the door before things become awkward. Awkward for Bruce, at least. Clint is waiting for him to say something, but he has no clue what to say. No clue what one says to a… whatever Clint is in this scenario. He should probably figure that out, too.

“What exactly do you teach?” Bruce sighs in relief, because that, thankfully, is something he knows how to talk about.

“I teach a range of topics.” Bruce resolutely doesn’t make eye contact. Not swimming around in Clint’s baby blue irises makes him feel a little bit more in control. “Most of them are related to the medical application of biochemistry and biotechnology, bioengineering, too. There’s quite a bit of overlap there. I have some classes on bioinformatics, one on ecology, another on microbiology and nanotech. A couple other things, too.”

Bruce hazards a look at Clint when he doesn’t hear a response. He gets a glimpse of wide-eyed confusion before Clint masks it with an amused smile. “You have a lot of classes.” He sounds impressed. “Lots of ‘bio’ stuff. Lots of ologies.” He mispronounces ologies. Ollo-geese.

“Heh. Yeah, well, I like living things.” Clint nods at him.

“That sounds like a buttload of classes, though. How do you, like, keep up with all of them? Do you not sleep?” Clint muses. “I’d ask if you’re a vampire, but you’re in the sun, so no dice there.”

Bruce doesn’t really know what to do with that. “It is a lot. But I only teach four or five classes at a time. Six if I’m feeling ambitious. The classes, their sizes, and their topics vary from semester to semester.”

Clint hums. “Big-brained Bruce. I like it.” Maniac smile. “You wanna know what I do?”

“Sure, yeah.” Bruce shifts his satchel to the other shoulder. He raises an eyebrow at that. Doesn’t Clint work at the recreation center?

Clint fist pumps in his head so hard that Bruce is sure he gets a wave of telepathic feedback.

“I’m in private security!” Clint declares proudly.

Bruce’s turn to hum in acknowledgement. Not that he tells Clint, but private security sounds like it would be markedly unexciting. On the other hand, Clint has already proven himself to be quite the character, and Bruce has a feeling that anything the archer does becomes exciting by virtue of his presence alone.

“That’s neat.” Bruce supplies. “What about the archery range?”

Clint flaps a hand dismissively. “That’s just for fun. I don’t get paid for it.” That tidbit has Bruce intrigued, and Clint can tell, and milks it. “Faradei works there pretty much full time, but I just do it so I can practice shooting for free. There aren’t that many places to do it in the city.”

“So,” Bruce smiles mildly, mischievously. “Does archery ever come in handy at your job?”

“Ha! I wish.” Clint sighs. “I’m handy with more than a bow, though. I have good aim with anything.” Bruce believes it. Doesn’t stop Clint from scanning the ground and scooping up a pebble, throttling it in his closed hand. “Give me something to hit. C’mon, pick a target. Anything.”

Clint is cocky, and Bruce is surprised how endearing he finds that. Still, if he’s going to spend any significant amount of time with the archer, even if it’s just for a day, it couldn’t hurt to take him down a few pegs. It’ll be a challenge, though. Bruce shivers when he remembers how Clint wrote his name in arrows just a few days ago.

“There.” Bruce grins, pointing high up to a nearby tree. A knot, 40 or 50 feet from the ground, with a hole in it. “Think you can get it in that hole?”

Clint twists his face. He looks put off, and for a split second Bruce thinks he set the bar too high, maybe literally.

Clint moves faster than Bruce can follow, just like when he shot his arrows, one after the other, an automated, calculated, inhumanly precise motion, and nonetheless effortless. Bruce just gapes as the pebble soars through the air and taps when it slides into the knot overhead.

“Give me a challenge next time.” Clint snorts. He reaches over to close Bruce’s jaw. And then Bruce is blushing again.

He looks back on his goal to knock Clint down a few, and he just remembers a video game he played when he was a kid. It took place in outer space, with a little cartoon rocket ship, and he went on different missions with his character, fighting aliens, harvesting minerals. If his character ever ran out of oxygen or sustained too much damage, it would make a little squeaking sound when it died, and big red letters would cover the screen:

-MISSION FAILURE-

Bruce is pretty sure all he managed to do was insult Clint.

The parking lot is just a few yards away, and all the way there, Bruce just feels flustered, embarrassed. A little turned on, too.

"It was a pebble, Banner." He tells himself. "He threw a pebble, and it hit its target. Calm down.”

“Which car is yours?” Bruce asks, out loud this time.

Clint turns sharply around, hands in his pockets. His deep, purple shirt compliments his eyes. “Oh. I took the subway here.”

“Hm.” Bruce hums. “Why didn’t you say so?” It’s curious, not accusatory.

“You said we were going to the parking lot.” He shrugs sheepishly. “I dunno. I guess I thought we were going to your car?”

“My car is in the staff parking lot.” Bruce smiles amusedly. He feels at ease, oddly so. He keeps the knowledge that the other shoe will drop soon closeby, tucks it away in the front pocket of his satchel. But his certainty is quickly melting into something that feels more like a paranoid anxiety.

“Oh. Yeah, that makes sense.” Clint gestures to the ‘Visitor Parking’ sign, though Bruce would be more aware of it than him.

The scientist gets the sense that this interaction is wrapping up, and not in any forced way, which is nice. It’s just the end of thier conversation.

“Listen, Clint, it was nice of you to come all the way out here to apologize.” He assumes it was a trek, anyway. It isn’t like he knows where Clint lives. The other man’s face has fallen. “I’m going to go get ready for my next class. I’ll see you Friday, okay?”

And just like that, Clint perks right back up. “Alright!”

Bruce offers a warm smile, tightens his grip on his satchel strap, and turns on his heels. He feels energized. Talking with unfamiliar people usually leaves him exhausted.

He hasn’t gotten far when Clint shouts. “Can I text you?”

Bruce almost snorts. Would he have given Clint his number if the answer were no? Maybe he’s just rusty on this whole talking-and/or-flirting-with-people thing. Yeah, that seems likely. He offers another smile. “Of course. I’ll talk to you later.”

Bruce doesn’t have a lot of dress clothes. Actually, Bruce just doesn’t have a lot of clothes. T’Challa emptied his entire closet earlier while Shuri trimmed his hair, which she liberally described as a ‘hot mess’.

That’s the least of his worries, and he is drowning in them. It’s hard to breath, which is ironic, considering how quickly he’s breathing.

"Should I really be going on a date with someone I know so litte about?” Bruce redoes his bowtie for the fourth time, then pulls it off again.

“Bruce, you are going on this date so that you can learn more about him.” T’Challa chuckles. “That is what dates are for.”

“This isn’t exactly familiar territory, T’Challa.” He growls. “Playboy."

Shuri shrugs. “I do not see why not. No harm in bringing one.”

It’s the most logical and neutral answer he could possibly receive, and still it makes him panic. Unjustified panic. His favorite.

“What if I don’t want to have sex? What if I’m not ready to have sex? What if I don’t remember how everything works?” He’s deeply red, willing himself not to swear and failing miserably. His words are strung so tightly together he isn’t sure he even spoke them in the correct order.

“Clinton will not force himself on you, Bruce. Cast that from your mind.” T’Challa is in front of him, hand on his shoulder. His voice is so calming. “He may express his desires. But I have always known you to speak your mind, Bruce. And never have I seen you participate in anything that you truly did not wish to do. Clint will respect your wishes.”

“Okay. Okay, yeah, I think you’re right. Plus, it’s just a first date. He probably won’t even want to, right?” Bruce exhales.

The siblings share another glance before Shuri shrugs. “Do you want to, Bruce?”

Something cold crawls up Bruce’s back on either side of his spine. “You’re my assistant. And a student.” He narrows his eyes. “Why am I talking about this with you?”

“You invited me.” She says, hands on her hips. “Besides,” she flaps a hand toward him and turns back to the pile of clothes on his couch, “Who else are you going to talk to about this? And didn’t you fire me?”

“Smartass.” He grumbles. He apologies immediately, though Shuri doesn’t hear it through her laughter. Head thrown back, the room looks brighter when she does. Her termination was never on the level. Bruce wouldn’t survive a day without her.

“I haven’t been on a date in a very long time.” He says, not for the first time. “I’m probably going to be vey bad at it.” He doesn’t know if he’s referring to the date itself or the hypothetical sex.

“So?” Shuri counters. She’s rummaging through his small assortment of button-ups. None of them are to her taste. She’s so flashy, and Bruce just isn’t. “You will just be more practiced for the next one.”

“Oh god.” Bruce cards a hand through his hair. More dates. Suddenly the prospect of the date ending well is more terrifying than the alternative, because what’s scarier than one date than two?

Bruce startles and falls on his ass when there’s a knock at the door.

“I’m going back to bed.” Bruce crawls toward his room with purpose, only makes it a few feet before T’Challa grabs him by the neck and hauls him to his feet. He brushes out the wrinkles in Bruce’s red and nude plaid and shouts out an invitation.

“You really shouldn’t keep your door unlocked. Weird people could just walk in.” Bruce’s brain eases at the sound of Clint’s voice while his body has the opposite reaction: his entire person is ready to run for the hills.

“One just did." Bruce thinks.

“Hey, what’s up? Sho-ree, right?” Clint reaches out a hand for Shuri to high five, the resultant slap is satisfying, and sounds like it hurt.

“Shuri.” She says.

“Right, right. Hey, dude!” He turns to Bruce and stops, the upper half of his body leans back to observe, like he isn’t seeing enough. “Dude, what are you wearing?”

Bruce and Clint are decked out in very different attire. When Bruce hears the word date, he thinks of dinner at places where you dress up a little, and there’s music playing and maybe a candle at your table. Clint, apparently, has other ideas, wearing a pair of camouflage cargo shorts and a grey tee that has a picture of a transformer on it.

“I thought we… Hi.” Bruce can’t stop staring at Clint, even though he knows it’s weird, and he should stop. He should really stop. But Clint is here now. In his apartment, which in and of itself is startling, on top of the fact that he now officially cannot back out of this date, which is… thrilling.

“Hi!” Clint says. He’s rocking on his feet like a metronome. Bruce can feel his excitement, it burns through the room like a strong incense. Bruce would buy it and burn it 24/7.

“Hi.” Bruce says again. His eyes are wide. His pries his hands away from where they're fisted in his button-up.

Clint leans forward and waits a beat. “Hi.” He parrots.

“Um, sorry. Hi.” Bruce wants to smack himself. Almost does. “I’m wearing... clothes?”

“Well yeah,” Clint snickers, “But why are you all dressed up like you’re going to church or something?”

“Date.” Bruce responds dumbly.

Clint snorts. “Oh, that’s funny. You look cute, by the way.” He glows at the look he gets from Bruce. “But no. We’re gonna be outside. You should wear like, comfortable stuff.” He gestures loosely to his torso. "And a baseball cap, 'cause it’s sunny. Oh, and a water bottle.” He holds up a silver hydro flask covered in stickers; logos of various sports teams that look stained and abused beyond belief.

Okay. So this is happening now.

“Right.” Bruce isn’t surprised. Can’t even make himself surprised. In fact, if the scenario were any different, that would be more surprising. He doesn’t know Clint well, but he should have known a fancy lunch isn’t what he meant by ‘date.’

It’s all the more exciting. Clint is something Bruce isn’t familiar with. He acts like the students at Asgard U, but more self-assured, and presumably with more reason to be so.

Bruce is excited.

"I’ll go change.” He feels the whisper of a smile coaxing the ends of his mouth. 

Clint looks about to ask if he can come and watch, but manages to control himself. Shuri skips over to Bruce, following him down the short, narrow hallway, though he shuts the door before she can follow him into his room.

“Bruce!” She bangs at the door.

“Can you fill a water bottle for me?” He unbuttons his shirt in private, thanks. “They’re in the cupboard next to the one under the sink. On the left.”

“Jeans or shorts, Banner?” He mumbles, shucking his dress khakis. He looks down. Taking into account what people commonly find attractive, Bruce would say his legs are one of his better features, aside from the faded scars, and those only noticeable if they’re being looked for. And if he’s really doing this, he might as well show off. He jogs almost every morning, and his legs show it. He settles on a pair of basketball shorts and a blue polo. The clothes don’t exactly match, but Clint said to wear what’s comfortable.

Clint is talking incessantly at T’Challa when Bruce finds them still in the living room, the CEO nodding periodically. Something about a man named Thor and his construction business.

“Heya.” Clint waves like he just arrived. “You look good! Ready to go?” Bruce notices, not for the first time, that there’s something strange about the archer's voice. Nothing major, nothing he can put his finger on. Something is just off by a fraction of a degree.

“I should grab some sunscreen, but then, yeah.” Bruce pulls open the coffee table drawers.

“Sun-screen! Didn’t even think of that.” Clint bonks himself on the head. He pulls a tie-dye baseball cap from one of his many, many pockets and flips it in the air. It lands flawlessly on his head, though he still needs to pull it down. It’s just a little disappointing. His hair is really nice. Fun to look at, like the rest of him.

“Do you need some?” Bruce fishes it out from between a pair of binoculars and an assortment of Asgard U swag he’s accumulated over the years. A yo-yo, a baseball cap (which he grabs), a frisbee, half a dozen pairs of sunglasses, what looks to be an assault whistle, as well as a bottle opener, and a bunch more cheap shit buried underneath. He squeezes a generous amount onto his hand and offers it to Clint.

“Thanks!” He beams.

“You should get the back of your neck, and your ears, too.” Bruce suggests, nose pointed toward the floor. Is he really telling his date how to apply lotion?

His date doesn’t seem to mind, though, and takes the suggestion to heart. Bruce blushes once again. He kinda-sorta-maybe wishes he were the one gently rubbing the cream into the skin of Clint’s neck. His oddly bulky ears. Even his face. Especially his face.

“Let’s go!”

Bruce rubs his own ear lightly as T’Challa shoves him out the door.

—

Clint took the subway to Bruce’s apartment, just like he did to Asgard U. Because, Bruce quickly finds out, Clint doesn’t own a car. Once again, Bruce finds endearing what he should probably be bothered, or at least bewildered with, considering that not only is Clint planning on taking them out of the city, but he was counting on being able to use Bruce’s car to do so.

Bruce hopes he wasn’t serious about covering the gas cost. It was a polite offer, but Bruce doubts he could handle the awkward of accepting cash from his date.

They’re a few miles outside of the city and Clint is playing around with the speakers, trying to connect to the bluetooth. He’d texted Bruce earlier in the week about music and was abjectly horrified to find out that Bruce’s music taste is nonexistent. The scientist has always caught grief for that; he prefers sounds of nature, the ambient drone of human activity in the city, or sometimes, nothing at all. He doesn’t avoid music in any sense of the word. He’s just never understood the hype.

Needless to say, Clint had gone ballistic, and all of his recommended songs, artists, and albums were politely repudiated on the grounds that Bruce doesn’t have any music or music applications on his phone, unless the ability to pull up a music video on youtube qualifies.

Havent u heard of Spotify??? Clint had texted.

Bruce had indeed heard of it. He, as a point of interest, didn’t know what it was until Clint so kindly educated him.

Who is Led Zepplin? Bruce asked somewhere in the exchange.

Just u wait. Imma blow your mind this Friday. Along with a plethora of emojis, was the only response he got.

“You can just play it from your phone, Clint.” Bruce stopped laughing after the first few minutes of frustrated fumbling. Now, approaching the quarter hour mark, watching the blond mumble as he pushes button after button on the radio and the sound system is just sad.

“Of course you would think that.” Clint says sourly. “Oh, take the next exit. Yeah, no, my guy, you do not just play The Beatles from a phone, not even a Stark-X. Not when there’s a sound system available.”

Bruce has at least one of each model of Stark Industries mobile device in a box in his closet, along with his other courting gifts from Tony. He prefers his handy Catcaller, despite it’s crude, informal name. A slightly outdated Vibrance Inc phone that T’Challa keeps trying to replace behind his back, at least Tony Stark can’t spy on him with it.

“You never told me where we’re going.” Bruce says placidly.

“You never asked.” Clint responds with distracted playfulness. “We’re going blueberry picking.”

Bruce considers that while the stereo makes a variety of beeps and buzzes that have Clint cursing under his breath. “Is that a euphemism?”

Clint stills and turns. “A what?”

“Blueberry picking. Is that a euphemism for something?” Bruce glances over to where Clint is looking at him like he’s speaking another language. “I’m asking if you’re serious.” He supplies.

“Oh. Yeah, I’m being serious. We’re headed to Sallis Orchards, it’s another forty minutes, maybe more.” Clint looks forward with a wistful smile. “Best fucking blueberries in the world. Wizard pumpkins, too, in the Fall.”

Bruce likes blueberries, loves them, actually, but can’t fathom how or why Clint would know that. It’s not an uncommon thing, he supposes. Still, what if Bruce had a sensitivity, and Clint was unknowingly leading him to a deathly allergic attack? Clint laughs and Bruce realizes he vocalized his concerns, only slightly less wordily.

“Blueberry pie.” Clint smiles and licks him lips. Bruce thinks it was innocent, though it’s hard to tell even when his attention isn’t divided. “Your job profile, at the college. The website lists all of the teachers’ favorite desserts. Yours is blueberry pie. That’s pretty neat, don’t you think? Do they do that at every college, or just AsU?”

Bruce didn’t even know they did that at Asgard, but he’s far more focused on Clint. More specifically, everything he doesn’t know about Clint. His anxieties from earlier are creeping back in, and he remembers, once again, why this date is such a bad idea. T’Challa said dates are for getting to know other people. So here goes nothing.

“What’s your favorite dessert?” Bruce breathes out the question.

Clint snaps his fingers and laughs a single, victorious laugh as the bluetooth finally connects. “Chocolate cupcakes!” He whoops.

——

The music is annoying at first, not because Clint will sing along to it at varying volumes, but because the blond turns it way down whenever he or Bruce says anything.

He learns a few things about Clint; they trade personal details on the road, grass and trees passing on either side.

Music down. Clint is 26 and completely unconcerned by their age difference. Music loud... Music quiet. He has a brother and two sisters, one of whom he lives with. Music hard... Music soft. He never went to college and lived with a traveling circus until he was 17. Music up.

He loves talking about himself, bursting with self-esteem, but he’s equally delighted when Bruce talks about his own life. Bruce thinks that should feel good, and maybe it does a little. Mostly he feels vulnerable.

Among the most interesting details Clint shares is that he was a cop, and was thrown off of the force almost a year ago. He grimaces when asked why, hastily changes the subject and says he’ll tell Bruce some other time.

He vaguely remembers something happening a year ago involving the police, something big and public. Wonders if Clint might have been involved, but his memory is peeved with him for some reason, so he puts it away.

He wants to ask Clint about his tattoos, and he’s getting a vibe, a sneaking suspicion that Clint wants him to ask about the tattoos, subtly showing them off, flexing slightly to bulge them out occasionally when Bruce steals a glance at the other man. It could just be his imagination. Bruce doesn’t ask. Not yet.

Bruce is thankful for the music eventually. It fills the quiet between questions, and somehow, Clint’s questionable singing sucks all the awkward right out of the car.

———

Clint wasn’t lying, the blueberries are heavenly. And Bruce has had some quality berries.

For his eighth birthday, Bruce’s mom had taken him somewhere, he doesn’t remember where, some secluded place off the road- they had to hike most of the way there, to a grove of wild blueberries. They were ripe and juicy, the slightest touch sent them hurtling to the ground, they were so tender.

Sallis Orchards can’t compare to those berries, but nothing ever will. Being there with Clint, though, it feels uncomfortably similar to what he can remember of that day. Bruce doesn’t like that. He barely knows Clint, he shouldn’t feel that way with Clint. They aren’t close. Not yet.

An ironic notion, seeing as Clint takes every opportunity to crowd Bruce’s space, and he’s far from shy about it.

The orchard is hot, kind of muggy, but very serene. Fun. Fun in a way that Bruce hasn’t experienced in a very long time. It’s a little like camping. Except that it’s nothing like camping. The only similarity is being outside. Camping is enjoyable, relaxing, private. This is public, stimulating, and fun. There are people about, not too many, but the place is busy, bustling.

The place is eponymously run by a stoic, aggressively Wiccan man named Theodore Sallis who clearly loves plants as much as he despises people. He doesn’t look entirely human, and Bruce can’t immediately tell that his clothes aren’t just several layers of leaves and moss. That’s not the weird part. The weird part is that Bruce swears the plants, all the plants, lean toward Theodore when he walks by, like how sunflowers follow the sun, and Clint acknowledges it like it’s a normal thing.

Mr. Sallis guides them through the front gate, and Bruce didn’t know a gate could look angry, angry that people are walking through it, but on the other side are rows and rows and rows of blueberries, the trellises go on and on and on until they disappear over a hill maybe a mile out. Ridiculous amounts of blueberries.

Clint grabs two wooden boxes and shoves one into Bruce’s arms. He’s glowing, drinking in Bruce and his surroundings. Bruce can tell there’s nowhere this boy would rather be. Clint starts walking, and Bruce follows, since what else is he going to do? He’s here to spend time with Clint. Get to know Clint. And also pick blueberries, but he has the feeling that’s the secondary objective here.

“Why are we going out so far?” Bruce asks. He’s not complaining. He has his hat and it is nice out. It is. And Bruce can walk for miles and miles, but this seems pointless, since they aren’t talking.

Clint’s head whips around. “Hm? We’re going far out. People don’t go far. I think it’s because they’re lazy, but the farther you go, the less people, better berries.”

“Do you come here often?” Bruce jogs a few steps forward so he can walk at Clint’s side, the archer’s eyes are fixed on his lips.

“As much as I can.” Clint smiles. “Whenever I can get a ride. I try to get out at least once for each harvest time. Man-Thing grows lots of stuff. Pumpkins. I said that one earlier. Uh, also apricots, and peaches. And apples, too, but I don’t really like apples. The ones here are okay- raspberries! Those too.”

It doesn’t take that long before Clint decides they’ve gone far enough, and then they go about their work. Clint very animatedly walks around, plucking berry after berry, eating half of them, filling his box with the rest. Bruce stays close, pacing himself, unlike Clint, who seems to be in a hurry and willing to spend all day there at the same time. Clint tells stories about his time in the circus, all the shenanigans he got in trouble for with his friends. He laughs at his own jokes and tellings, and Bruce laughs along, even though he’s sure a good number of them are made up.

“It’s weird that you’re a teacher.” Clint says. It’s well past noon and they’re sitting across from each other under one of the wider arches that cover the gaps between trellises. Clint is throwing berries into the air and catching them in his mouth. A couple times now he’s thrown berries into Bruce’s mouth, too. The first time, Bruce was caught off guard. The second time, too. After that, he can admit it’s pretty entertaining. Fun, like Clint.

“I’m a professor.” Bruce remarks. “Why is that weird?”

“‘Cause you don’t like people.” Clint says. “Or not lots of them at once, anyway. What’s the difference ‘tween a professor and a teacher?”

Bruce’s gaze fixates on Clint’s mouth. Then his eyes, which are gentle and fluffy but very intent. Intense. Bruce wouldn’t mind being closer to those eyes. That face. That mouth.

Bruce has gotten into some very uncomfortable conversations-turned-arguments with the educational studies department at Asgard about the distinction, but in this case, it’s probably best to stick with the basics. “Professors teach at the upper level. Higher post-secondary institutions. Teachers teach at grade schools and career schools.” He waits for Clint to nod. “Why do you think I don’t like people?”

“You don’t like groups of people.” Clint responds immediately through a small mouthful of blueberry.

“Okay, but what makes you think that?”

Clint grins smugly. “I don’t think it, I know it.” It takes Bruce a moment to realize that Clint is teasing him, being blatantly bratty. Or… braggy more than bratty. “You don’t hide it.” Clint shrugs, his expression neutral again. “You were really tense at the entrance. And when you saw those frat guys in the garage you were all scrunched up. Your whole body relaxed when they left. And when we came out here you weren’t tense anymore. You don’t smile when there are people around.”

Bruce mulls over Clint’s words, opens his mouth for three blueberries to land inside in quick succession.

“It’s different with teaching.” Bruce decides, opting to look to the side, not at Clint’s face. In control. There’s a feeling, a heat beneath his abdomen. It’s akin to arousal, but he’s not hard, and he doesn’t feel the need to be. “I’m in a position of authority. I’m responsible for those students, and they’re counting on me. It’s a predictable situation.” Bruce is in control in the classroom. That’s the difference.

He looks back at Clint. The blond is regarding him curiously, like Bruce said something that made sense, but he’s never thought about it before.

“Tell me more about myself.”

Bruce didn’t know that was something he was going to say. He did not give those words permission to leave his mouth. Didn’t even know they were there.

Clint gives him a look that Bruce really wants to become familiar with, like Bruce is some precious treasure, likes he’s the sun. The complete center of Clint’s cheerful existence. Bruce thinks it might as well be the center of the universe.

“Well, you’re really really smart. Really really really smart. Like, I didn’t know someone could be as smart as you are.” Clint sighs and crushes a blueberry between forefinger and thumb, licks the incriminating evidence from his fingers. “You have good taste in desserts. You talk real pretty, too. You use a lot of words.”

Bruce grunts an affirmative sound and clears his throat a little. “I can’t hear you very well.” He smiles and eyes the ground, picks at some grass. “Maybe you should come closer. So I can hear you.”

Clint looks like a puppy; excited, energetic, like he wants to bound over and tackle Bruce into the ground. He hesitates, though. Reservation.

“What did I do at the range?” Clint has tucked away his puppy, tied it down. He looks desperate for something else now. “You ran out like the place was on fire. Why?”

Bruce sighs. He wants to freeze, but he’s too warm. Doesn’t hurt that it’s hot out. He feels incredibly awkward about that afternoon. That small section of that Saturday afternoon, when he couldn’t even compose himself enough to shoot the stupid arrow. T’Challa dismissed the entire exchange when Bruce relayed it to him. Apparently Faradei manhandled him the exact way Clint did when T’Challa first started. Completely professional, then. “I’m not used to… being close to people. I like it,” He quickly adds with easy sincerity, “But it doesn’t happen very often. And not at all with people I don’t know. I didn’t... know how to react.”

Bruce artfully decides to omit the part about getting a boner.

The archer takes a minute to consider, he chews on his lip worryingly and stretches at his elbow. “Do you… know me now?” Clint’s voice is on edge. He’s leaning forward even with his back plastered against the archway.

“No.” Bruce answers honestly. He still doesn’t know how to react to that proximity. Doesn’t know how he would react. But there’s an itch beneath his skin; a searing, throbbing itch, the kind that drives a person insane if they don’t scratch it. He doesn’t know. He’s dying to find out, though. “But I think- I think it would be nice to change that.” Where did all this boldness come from? Is he flirting? Is Bruce flirting? He wouldn’t really know… but it feels like it.

Clint’s puppy is free again, and the fuzzy ball of excitement wastes no time at all. Bruce barely blinks before Clint is inches from him, buzzing and buzzing, and Bruce is nearly uncomfortable with how calm he is over having this gorgeous man about to touch him. Touch him.

Touch.

Clint hesitates. Bruce’s legs are crossed elegantly, and the archer’s calloused hand is hovering above his knee. Bruce doesn’t mind this Clint. This Clint that flutters between apprehension and shamelessness. It’s… tender.

Slow as syrup, Bruce grips Clint’s irresolute wrist. It’s smooth on the bottom and course on top with short, blond arm hairs. He doesn’t move Clint’s hand; instead, he lets his own go slack, relieves himself of the burden, of the responsibility. Gravity brings them together. Bruce is touching Clint, and Clint is touching Bruce.

Clint is excellent at touching.

————

Clint’s lips are slightly chapped. They’re wet, too. Clint’s kisses are damp, and full of vigor. Bruce feels unsure about it. He doesn’t want to kiss like he’s desperate. He keeps his lips together when Clint opens his mouth. Thankfully the archer takes the hint at that, and calms himself. His kissing becomes less desperate. He strokes his hand up and down Bruce’s arm, always stopping at the elbow.

Bruce appreciates it.

The entire thing makes him want to panic. He feels out of control. Completely out of control. He wants to cry with how afraid he is. Clint is there, looking beautiful, feeling amazing, and any moment Bruce could lose his mind. Be pulled into the recesses of his brain by the unpredictable monster that lurks there. He could lash out and hurt Clint and he wouldn’t know it. Wouldn’t be able to stop it. Clint, with all his impressive reflexes, wouldn’t see it coming.

Then he calms again. He kisses back. The feeling is too wonderful to feel afraid. His skin and his shirt have so many textures, and the very best part is the spirit behind his kisses. Because it isn’t Bruce’s favorite sensation when Clint takes it too quickly, too desperately, too much. But Clint lands every kiss like Bruce is the only thing in the world. Kisses Bruce like he wants to. Like there’s nothing else.

It feels good. It feels really good.

Why was Bruce so worried about this?

—————

Bruce is in a daze when Clint leads him back toward the entrance, their boxes sufficiently full. So dazed, in fact, that Clint has to lead him by the hand, and Bruce laces their fingers together. Clint squeezes gently.

Their hands are still laced together when Clint hands their collected berries to Theodore ‘Man-Thing’ Sallis, who regards Clint familiarly while bundling up the fruits of their labor. Clint yammers on about the same person he mentioned earlier, Thor and, if Bruce heard correctly, his company, Hammer Construction.

Sallis doesn’t look absolutely disgusted that Clint is talking, which Bruce figures is a rarity. The occasional glance he springs Bruce’s way is filled with contempt.

Clint pays for their berries and bags them up, and Bruce finally breaks out of his kiss-drunkenness when they arrive back at his car, Clint detaching their fingers.

“Let’s go to my apartment!” Clint bounces in his seat. Bruce nods in agreement before he can convince himself not to and reminds Clint to buckle up, quipping under his breath a former cop should be familiar with ‘click it or ticket’.

Clint doesn’t hear him. “We can make pie!” The archer promises. Bruce wants to go to Clint’s apartment. He isn’t very interested in making pie.

He lets Clint put on music and sing along the whole way back. The sun is on its way down, and Bruce thinks the implication is that if he goes to Clint’s apartment tonight, he won’t be going back to his own. That could be a good thing. It could also be a very, very bad thing. He hasn’t decided.

Clint lives about the same distance from Asgard University as Bruce, albeit in the complete opposite direction, and it takes a while to find a parking spot on the street. Clint pays for the spot before Bruce is even fully out of the car. Bruce is still mulling over different options and the various scenarios the evening might play out to while Clint drags him across the street and into the building. Up to apartment 28. Into the very… lived-in looking vestibule, common room, and kitchen.

It looks like Clint lives here.

Clint pushes aside an assortment of food and utensils and other random crap to make room on the kitchen counter, ignoring several objects that clatter to the floor. Bruce usually hates clutter, but he has other things on his mind. The archer is rinsing off the blueberries when Bruce finally speaks.

“I don’t partake in one-night stands.” He says, louder than intended, but maybe not loud enough, because Clint turns to him and hums like he didn’t hear. Bruce tries again, resolving to not be so formal and awkward this time. “I don’t… hookup.” God, he sounds like one of his students. “I don’t want that. If we do something tonight, I’d like to see you again sometime. Go on another date sometime.” He wants to add that he definitely, definitely does not want to have actual sex tonight, but he refrains, already on edge and worried that Clint will get weirded out by his antics.

“I’m cool with that.” Clint smiles and pops a berry into his mouth. “Today was fun!” Another berry, and he looks at Bruce with his sci-fi vision again. Scanning. Scanning. “We don’t have to fuck if you don’t want, Bruce,” The scientist startles as the sudden crassness. “We can just make pie. And then, you know: Eat it.” Another berry. Bruce watches as it slips between Clint’s lips, follows the movement of his jaw when he chews.

“I don’t want to make pie,” Bruce says firmly, and he flinches again at his own voice. He’s so rusty, he’s making a fool of himself left and right, and for some reason, Clint doesn’t seem to care. And for some other reason, that just puts Bruce more on edge. “I don’t think I want to… fuck, either.” He says hesitantly. Cursing in front of people is weird. “Can we just…” Clint’s eyes are so pretty. “See where it goes?”

Clint blindly reaches for the duck-print washcloth hanging off the oven handle, dries his hands, and leaves it in a bunch on the counter. Then he takes Bruce’s hand and leads him out of the kitchen.

——————

Bruce knows that Clint was expecting to get him in his bed tonight the second he enter’s the archer’s room. It’s not clean, but it looks tidy. At least by what Bruce assumes Clint’s standards are. Books and trinkets have been hastily placed on a desk and a shelf, there’s a pile of clothes visible in the closet through the cracked door, and a pile of comic books have been shoved under the bed. The bed has fresh sheets on it- the linens smell like fabric softener.

The blond was expecting Bruce in his bed tonight. He wanted Bruce in his bed tonight.

And just like that, Bruce is getting hard again.

Their lips connect as Clint draws them backward toward the bed, kicking the door closed for good measure. Bruce toes off his shoes and suddenly he’s above Clint, hands planted on defined shoulders for support, feeling like he’s pressing the blond into the mattress. Clint is just grinning. Bruce hopes he is, too.

———————

The more they kiss, the more and more aware Bruce is of the condom in his back pocket, and how much he doesn’t want to use it… yet. This is exactly where he wants to be: kissing Clint and letting Clint kiss the life out of him. Clint touching him and memorizing how he feels. He doesn’t want more. He does, actually, but not tonight. Not tonight.

Their shirts are both off and hips are slowly inching towards each other. Bruce can tell Clint is aroused, the look in his eye, then the bulge in his shorts, and Bruce is wearing basketball shorts, for fuck’s sake, so of course Clint can tell, too. Then Clint slows down, slows their kisses, slows his touching, and Bruce can think again, sorting out the anxieties, separating them from the pleasures so he can calculate.

He’s about to say something, no clue what yet, but Clint beats him to it.

“I gotta tell you something.” Clint whispers. His voice trembles. Weird. Bruce withdraws so he can look at Clint. Those blue eyes are wavering now, not so filled with confidence, and Bruce feels in control looking at them, which makes his stomach twist. Those eyes are supposed to make him lose control. He was counting on that, oddly enough. What’s he supposed to do now?

Clint clears his throat. He looks sad. His face is filled with shame and worry, lines and wrinkles erupting everywhere, and Bruce worries even more, afraid he’s done something wrong.

“You should know,” Clint shudders, he grabs at Bruce’s arms, afraid he’ll run away, grips them with bruising force.

“Yeah?” Bruce shifts and Clint’s grip loosens slightly.

For Bruce, falling asleep is a process. It never just happens; it always takes place over a period of time, usually a few minutes, but the transition can last significantly longer, sometimes upwards of half an hour. It helps if he exhausts himself beforehand, or if he had a physically, or emotionally, trying day. It also helps if he’s sharing a bed.

Waking, on the other hand, is always instantaneous. He’s heard things about a space between dream and reality, when one’s mind is trying to tear away from sleep. He’s never experienced it. His dreams end like a television when the power goes out; abrupt, rude, and inarguable. And of course, any sensory stimulation is instantly present, usually amplified, his body has always been especially sensitive when he wakes.

When Bruce wakes up in a bed that is not his own, awake and instantly alarmed by the lack of familiarity, he is acutely aware of two things.

The first is that there is a pleasantly warm wall of skin pressed against his torso, he feels plastered to what’s in front of him. It presses back into him again and again, but each push only draws him closer.

The second is that the inside of his boxers are a sticky, crusty mess of finish, and it’s the most uncomfortable sensation he can remember experiencing.

Bruce presses the rewind button in his mind and takes stock of exactly how he got here. Clint. That’s right, he had a date with Clint. His first date in years, and it was amazing, and it ended with an even more amazing night. There was so much touching, everything had been so warm and chaotic and pleasurable. And intimate. And different. Clint made him orgasm three times before he found his own release as they ground against each other, completely clothed from the waist down like a couple of desperate teenagers.

Clint is sound asleep in front of him, the arm that isn’t flung around the archer is very asleep tucked under his own body. He kisses the nape of Clint’s neck gently and readjusts himself, quietly as he can, shakes out his violently tingling appendage and flinches when Clint sleepily whimpers at the loss of contact. He pulls a sheet over the archer’s torso fondly and looks for his phone.

He retrieves it along with his polo shirt and cringes with every step, the grind of his crusted undergarments against his crotch is horrible and disgusting, and if he didn’t know any better he’d think he has sand in his boxers.

He stumbles out into the hall with muted movements, so unsure of what happens now. He feels warm, inside and out, and full. There’s a spring garden in his chest, a fountain of green life. Bruce is very much alive. Still crusty and gross, but alive.

The bathroom looks like the rest of the apartment, namely that Clint lives there, along with his sister, Bruce remembers, taking note of the aggressively pink razor sitting in a ceramic cup along with an iridescent purple men’s brand. Bruce uses the same kind, but he buys the green ones. He’s at a bit of a loss now, not sure what he came in here for, other than the bathroom is where one becomes not-gross. Is it appropriate to use Clint’s shower? Clint’s towels?

He doesn’t want to wake Clint up, that seems like the most impolite option, and eventually he decides he’ll rinse off and then air dry himself. It’ll give Clint some time to wake up, and he can figure things out from there.

He only washes his lower half to help deal with the drying off predicament. Just a quick rinse, so he doesn’t have to think too hard, and afterwards he has no godly idea what to do with his boxers, since there is no fucking way he’s putting them back on (he might actually burn them the next time he goes camping), so he settles on stuffing them in his shorts pocket after shaking his legs dry. He’d dump them in the bathroom wastebasket, but then Clint (and maybe his sister) would see them, and absolutely not.

He follows a delightful smell into the kitchen, tugging his shirt down over his head in time to see Clint turn toward him, grinning appreciatively.

“You could’ve left it off, you know.” He jabs, pointing a spatula in the scientist’s direction.

The boldness from yesterday is still flowing strong in Bruce. He doesn’t feel meek and mild like he should. He feels like he belongs. Not necessarily here with Clint, though that too, but he belongs in this state of mind, confident and craving interaction and good-natured teasing instead of shying away from anything that resembles emotion.

“Just a little chilly.” Bruce shrugs. It’s not a lie, but really he feels shrewdly naked going commando and the shirt makes him feel a little better. Clint, shirtless and decked out in loose grey sweatpants with a US army logo on them, eyes the amorphous bulge in Bruce’s pocket but doesn’t comment. Bruce has a perfect view of his ’trickshot’ tattoo.

“You’re not vegetarian, are you?” He stirs around the contents of his pan without looking away from Bruce. “I added bacon bits to the eggs. I can make more though- baconless ones.”

Guess he’s staying for breakfast.

Bruce waves him off and asks for a cup of water. Turns out Clint’s fridge spits out ice like there’s an avalanche inside, but the water dispenser makes an earth-shattering, terrifying noise when he clicks it (and for a solid 0.3 seconds, Bruce is entirely convinced the world is ending), so he settles for tap while Clint laughs at him.

The gargantuan dining room table is covered in a variety of art projects. The oval table itself takes up most of the room, one half is covered in skeins of cloth and thread, some embroidery hoops, as well as some measuring tables and tapes, and what looks to be a very high quality sewing machine. The rest of the table is covered with a plastic tarp secured with blue tape, adorned with some half-finished abstract paintings, a structure made out of popsicle sticks, and a dried out sculpture of what might have been a hand.

They takes their plates to the couch- the dining room is busy.

Clint mumbles song lyrics under his breath while they settle down and Bruce uses the opportunity to take everything in. The apartment… is a mess. An odd mess, though. It’s not gross, like a frat house, or Betty’s sister's apartment after a party. There aren’t any food products strewn about, rotting or fresh, and the only laundry in sight are the lazily discarded jackets and footwear by the door. With the exception of the kitchen and Clint’s room, the entire place smells like an art studio. It’s disorganized, but not gross. Bruce imagines that besides the stacks of opened mail and takeout menus, nothing needs to be thrown out. A good rearranging and a thorough vacuum and the place might not look like a tornado hit it.

A few minutes into their meal, right when the silence is getting awkward (for Bruce at least. Clint just gives him warm smiles periodically and digs into his food), the door slams open to reveal a petite brown-haired woman. Her yellow blazer and flower-pattern skirt might as well be armor, because the girl looks ready for battle.

“Clint!” She hollers, strips her clothes off and hurls her backpack across the room. “Fucking Dave! He blew me off, again, and I’m going to- Oh, hi!” Her voice goes from fiery demon to sunshine and daisies without missing a beat. “Oh my gosh! You’re Bruce Banner!”

Bruce almost mistakes her for one of his students, all starry-eyed and smiling, waiting to meet him, aching to hear him. That’s probably why he isn’t more taken aback. He wipes his mouth and walks over, extends a hand in greeting.

“I am.” He agrees. She takes his hand and firmly yanks on it in a much more aggressive handshake than he was prepared for. Before he can ask who she is, she talks in her bubbly, sugary voice again.

“Oh wow, you are cute. Yeah, Clint hasn’t shut up about you for days, it’s really nice to meet you! I’m Janet, but you should call me Jan. I’m that dummy’s sister.” She points at Clint as if he’s done something wrong, and the accused sticks out his tongue in response.

Bruce should have guessed she was the roommate-sister. That’s the simplest explanation, except for the sister part, since Janet looks as much like Clint as a strawberry looks like a banana.

Janet pushes him back toward the couch and vanishes, reappearing with a fork moments later, she sits on the coffee table atop a scattering of magazines and digs into Clint’s eggs. She begins rambling about a boy named David, and Bruce can’t tell if he’s her boyfriend or her mortal enemy, but alongside one of those, they have an art project together and Dave is being very uncooperative about it.

Bruce is thankful for the noise, the talk. He doesn’t participate much, he’s content to listen and learn, if for no other reason than that these lively people seem to know a whole lot more about him than he knows about them. They make numerous attempts to draw him into the conversation, never deterred when he offers monosyllabic responses or just hums. Jan is going to fashion school, he finds out.

It takes him an embarrassingly long time to realize that they’re adopted siblings. Either that or they’ve deemed themselves brother and sister from a deep bond. There’s no way they share blood.

Eventually, Clint retrieves a shirt, and changes into jeans while he’s at it. “I have to go to the range.” He says, giving Bruce yet another sci-fi scan. Jan has retreated to the kitchen with their dishes. Bruce doesn’t know what to say. What’s the protocol for this? He leaves now, right? He leaves and then they text or call to make more plans later. “Do you wanna come over tonight?” Clint looks like he’s inviting the floor instead of Bruce himself.

He could. He doesn’t have plans tonight. He never has plans on Saturday nights, aside from the occasional outing or inning with T’Challa. He feels deterred, though. It would be too soon to spend the night again. Two nights in a row, and right after their first date? That’s… fast. Bruce wants, needs, some time to think and sort. He’s emotional right now, and that can cloud his judgement. He had fun, but does he really like Clint, or is he just needy, starved for affection?

He doesn’t like the thought, but it wouldn’t be fair to let Clint believe otherwise if that is the case. This place, it feels like home. Walking into the kitchen, he realizes, and being greeted by Clint with that smile, that smile like the archer had just won the lottery. Looking at Bruce because he likes to look. It all felt like coming home.

And last night, even the memory of it is too goddamn wonderful. Grinding, touching. And there’s so much more to do. So much more they could do. So much more wonderful to experience.

How can he make sound decisions when his perceptions are being supercharged like this? When he’s floating, and he didn’t even know it, and he can’t bring himself down?

“No.” He realizes he was quiet for way, way too long. “I’d like to, but I have plans with a friend tonight. Uh, rain check?” It’s a lie and it’s not. Either way, the muscles in his throat constrict.

Clint rubs the back of his head, his lips are pouting downward, his eyes veiling sadness for a second. “Yeah, sure.” The archer trails off into a mumble. “Rain- rain check.” He nods toward the door and doesn’t look at Bruce again, bringing a hand to his face as he leaves the room.

Seeing that look on Clint’s face, walking back to his car, and walking back into his own apartment… it feels like leaving home.

=============

He calls Hank as soon as he gets home to ask if they can do scary movie night today instead of tomorrow. It makes his throat feel better, it’s been tight since Clint walked out of his own living room like it was ridden with plague.

He got out of there fast, too. He felt unwelcome, making Clint unhappy, and he knows, something in the back of his head claws at his sinuses and tells him that Clint knows that he was lying. That he didn’t have plans… not originally, anyway. He feels guilty. Weighted with guilt. Not for leaving, not for a night to think. He needs tonight to sort through this maelstrom of emotion that’s tearing apart his insides in the best possible way.

Bruce feels bad for lying. He hates lying. He and Clint are at the beginning of their potential… relationship? And Bruce just tainted it with a lie. He could’ve told the truth. He had no reason not to.

And now… he sort of wants to cry. And now, well, now he feels homesick.

Hank brings Ethiopian food.

=============

The senior scientist spends a lot of time listening. Bruce hasn’t rambled this much since… well, there’s a very good chance that he’s never rambled this much about anything not science-related. Hank listens to Bruce describe every detail of their date, from the moment Clint walked into his apartment to the moment they’re at now, Hank nodding thoughtfully, still blushing because Bruce described his and Clint’s night together, lost himself in his rant and forgot to put the filter on his mouth.

Oops.

“Bruce.” Hank looks at him earnestly. There’s a kind sadness to his eyes, but hope, too. Hope. “Since you first saw Clint, even though it wasn’t in the best of circumstances, you’ve been acting differently. We’ve known each other a very long time,” He sighs. Bruce is still catching his breath. “I haven’t seen you like this, not even a little bit, since Betty. Not that I think Clint is Betty.” He quickly rectifies. “Just that, I don’t think it’s a bad thing that you're feeling.”

They stare at each other for a while, and Bruce blinks first, casts his gaze aside and shoves his hands into his hoodie pocket.

When every important person in someone’s life is pointing in one direction, that’s usually where one should look. Not always, but most of the time. Especially when those important people are loving, and kind, and only want the best for the people they love.

And right now, Bruce can’t think of a compelling reason not to look in that direction. And he doesn’t want to. The nagging inclination to say no no no no no… it’s gone. Like it was never there. He can want. Better than want. He can have.

His phone is in his hand, and Bruce turns away, only so that Hank’s sun-bright smile isn’t blinding him.

May I come over tomorrow? Bruce presses send and lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. But he’d been holding it for a while. If you aren’t busy, I’d like to take you to dinner.

He doesn’t get the chance to put his phone down before it’s buzzing.

Hell yeah! Cant wait!

=============

The first thing Bruce does Sunday morning is get to work researching. There’s a heat pooling in his stomach, it’s filling into a nervous pit. His insides are boiling.

PrEP is covered by his insurance, so no problem there, and all he has to do to get a prescription is fill out a few forms online and talk to a rep on the phone.

He can get his Truvada later that week, and they’ll deliver it to him, which isn’t really necessary, but it’s a cool bonus.

Obviously, they’ll still need to use condoms. And the PrEP takes seven days to become optimally protective. The side effects are astoundingly underwhelming, all things considered. Typical of any drug, there’s the threat of nausea, headaches, fatigue. Loss of appetite isn’t too concerning, though T’Challa will have a field day or two if it happens. There’s a threat of damage to his kidneys. That doesn’t sound fun, but all he has to do is get regular checkups to make sure nothing happens there.

And aside from the kidney problems, which are a rare side effect to begin with, all the side effects are supposed to subside after the first month or so.

Honestly, Bruce thinks he might deal with the nausea anyway if it means he gets to share a bed with Clint.

=============

Clint is extraordinarily good at touching, in no small part because he touches like he wants to. He wants to touch Bruce, and he likes Bruce to react, like a scavenger hunt, finding all the spots that make Bruce gasp and shudder and blush. Bruce looks into his baby blue’s and can see that the archer is memorizing them, writing them down in some great and awesome sex notebook in his mind.

Every touch makes Bruce feel like a virgin. Betty was, strictly speaking, his first, and though he wasn’t her’s, she was far from experienced when they met. They learned what they liked together, all shy touches and shaky sounds. Clint digs in like he belongs right under Bruce’s skin; eager and hungry and miles away from anything shy.

Bruce isn’t sure how to keep up at first, but it isn’t a problem. Clint is very direct in telling him what he likes and how to touch him, and equally instructive if anything happens that he doesn’t like, in theory, at least. Bruce hasn’t done anything to make the blond uncomfortable yet. Clint doesn’t seem like the type who would keep that information from him, though, so Bruce has to wonder if he’s even capable of making the archer uncomfortable. Above all, Clint seems interested in Bruce, and anything Bruce related brings him joy.

Bruce can relate to that notion more and more every time Clint’s demanding fingers lay claim to his skin.

The scientist is more than happy to let Clint take charge in bed for now. Clint knows what he likes, and is an avid student in learning Bruce’s pleasures. Bruce likes the way it feels, not just physically, to let Clint take the lead. The bedroom is Clint’s laboratory, and Bruce is his precious specimen for which he has all manner of wicked experiments planned.

Clint is far more patient than Bruce would have credited him for. The scientist was surprised by how uncomfortable he is at the idea of being completely naked with someone else. The thought of it made his stomach curl, his fingers trembling when they undid his zipper.

“You don’t have to.” Clint says softly. He pushes away Bruce’s hands, gentle but sure and firm. Taking control. Not quite, though. Bruce is giving him control, because he’s asking for it, and somehow demanding it at the same time. He unzips Bruce, but the scientist doesn’t panic like he feels he should.

Clint’s fingers drag on the skin of his hips, pausing at his hipbones, worries at them with soothing thumbs. He also thinks that Bruce is too skinny, takes every opportunity to feed him. He pushes the front of his boxers down so that Bruce’s cock springs free. He takes it in his hand and Bruce gasps. He could cum right now. Clint is so understanding, so patient, and so eager at the same time. He takes whatever Bruce gives and treasures it, and God, with every passing second, Bruce wants to give him more.

By day three, Bruce is completely naked.

It feels wonderful. His likes jerking Clint off. He likes to sit behind Clint, rut against his back and play with his nipples while he strokes the archer’s cock, makes him hum.

Clint really likes Bruce’s mouth on him, the scientist discovers. Biting, licking, kissing. Clint wants it all. His neck is so sensitive, and biting it makes the most delicious noises. Bruce bites too hard one time and Clint gasps. Bruce apologizes profusely, but Clint rolls his eyes and kisses Bruce hard. And then harder. He grinds their cocks together.

The next morning, Bruce catches Clint looking at the residual teeth marks in the mirror, tracing the circular pattern of cavities in his skin, pressing the small, healing bruises. He turns and smiles sheepishly when he sees Bruce watching him. Bruce doesn’t miss the bulge in the blond’s boxers.

Bruce makes sure to bite too hard again.

He can’t wait to get his mouth on Clint’s cock. He’s never sucked a dick before and he’s looking forward to it more than he thought he would. He likes the weight of Clint’s member in his hand; hot and fleshy. Clint isn’t circumcised, which is another thing Bruce didn’t know he’d be shamelessly turned on by. It probably isn’t the uncutness that’s a turn on. No, it’s definitely just Clint. Everything about the archer makes him drool.

He won’t be able to taste Clint, and that’s a shame, but there’s an added bonus that he’s never actually experienced anything different. He’s only ever had protected sex, and he’s never been disappointed by it. 

When Clint guides his hand down during a sheet-tangling makeout session, he freezes when he realizes his fingers are not being led to Clint’s dick. His fingers are soaked in spit from where Clint was sucking on them like candy mere seconds ago. Bruce is very suddenly conscious of the fact that Clint showered before joining him in bed tonight, but honestly, that’s his mildest concern.

Bruce hadn’t, hasn’t, thought much about any kind of ass play, despite the seeming inevitability of it now. He’d been so focused on sucking Clint off. He hasn’t let Clint suck him off yet, and denying the archer’s pleading eyes, his gorgeous, puppy dog face, was amongst the greatest challenges of Bruce’s life. But Bruce is adamant in his decision. He’ll refuse blowjobs unless and until he can return the favor.

Thinking on it now, Bruce had the latent assumption that Clint would be on top. That Clint would fuck him, finger him, take him. The thought is terrifying and thrilling, and he definitely needs more time to think on it. Betty got a finger in him a few times, and that was always nice. 

There are a million thoughts going through his head. Clint wants his ass played with. In any relevant scenario, that isn’t a problem, Bruce realizes with an inward chuckle. That is very marvelously far from being any kind of problem. But… what if he isn’t good at fingering? What if he tears Clint? He’s never fucked someone’s ass before. What if Bruce wants to get fucked? Would Clint be into that, or is he only interested in being fucked? Clint favors the little spoon when they cuddle… is that an indication of anything?

He’s distracted by the feeling of Clint’s hole. It’s soft and tight and a little bit wet. He can’t help himself, nor should he. He rubs his finger speculatively, a whispered, circular motion. Clint makes a noise, and Bruce almost cums from that sound alone.

He rubs a bit more before plunging his finger inside. Clint’s hole gives easily. It sucks Bruce’s finger in, and the heat around his digit is- there’s no other word for it- divine. He wants that heat. He never wants to be without that heat, he thinks, taken with the moment. He moves his finger around gently, he studies Clint’s face like the scientist he is, and takes note of how Clint reacts to each motion, each area.

He finds Clint’s prostate and as soon as he applies pressure the man writhes and whines, his back flexes and arches and his weight falls onto Bruce, nearly knocking the wind from him. Thank you anatomy classes.

Excited, emboldened, he withdraws his fingers so Clint can spit on it, then goes back, eases his finger in and out. He hears Clint whisper, breath hot against his ear, cheek to cheek, Clint is hot in every way, “Put another finger in me.”

So Bruce does. Clint whines and grinds again, gets a hand on his cock and begins pumping furiously. Bruce presses in harder, pumps his fingers just a little faster.

He cums all over Bruce’s stomach. He worriedly wipes at the puddle with tissue seconds later, but Bruce couldn’t give a damn. He might have to make fingering Clint his new hobby.

Bruce braced himself for an awkward and clunky conversation and was mildly baffled when it was anything but. He should know by now. Clint isn’t shy about anything, least of all sex. He knows that Clint shares their exploits, though not in great detail, with his sister, and he blushes but doesn’t protest. He asked that Clint not tell anyone else, was assured that he hadn’t and wouldn’t. He likes the way Clint talks to Janet about him. It’s like Clint is bragging, showing him off even when he’s not in the room.

Clint was blunt when Bruce brought up the fingering and the subsequent questions that rattled around in his head.

“All of it.” Clint said gleefully, a sparkle in his eyes. “I wanna do it all, Bruce. Whatever you’re down with. I want you to fuck me, I want to fuck you. I wanna suck myself off while you fuck me.”

Bruce gaped at that, because he didn’t know that was possible. It never occurred to him that might be something that someone could do. Clint laughs at him. He’s on day five of Truvada. Day seven can’t come soon enough.

==============

They spend the whole week like that; starting Monday, Bruce goes to Clint’s place every night. He goes home after work to change and shower, but he spends every night at Clint’s apartment. In Clint’s bed.

Janet doesn’t mind at all, seems delighted by his presence. She gives him a toothbrush to keep in their bathroom and makes some space on the shelf behind the mirror. Bruce puts his Truvada adjacent to Clint’s pill bottles with a sense of pride. He sees, by accident since he does his very best not to snoop, Clint’s prozac, and Janet’s Wellbutrin. After some hesitation, he pushes his Zoloft next to the PrEP. He takes them both back, though. It’s a nice thought, and he wants them there, but he doesn’t live here. He can’t keep his meds somewhere he doesn’t have immediate access to.

Even so, things are moving so goddamn quickly. Bruce is just enjoying the wind in his hair. Clint makes ‘wizard’ pancakes, and shares Bruce’s interest in old movies. Clint is horrified that Bruce hasn’t seen Juno, and evidently he watches the movie on a loop, because Janet rolls her eyes and slams her bedroom door when she sees the DVD.

Clint has plans the next Sunday, and it’s a bummer that he has to sleep alone in his apartment again. It isn’t so bad. He knows he’ll see Clint again soon.

T’Chall and Shuri laugh and tease him relentlessly. A couple of his students comment on how he’s different. One of them says he has a spring in his step, which makes him feel momentarily old, but whatever. He even has an easier time dealing with the twins. The Maximoffs noticed the difference, too, had upped their flirting. Bruce wondered if they thought his cheery demeanor was their doing.

=============

Thursday. Day seven of PrEP. Well, technically yesterday was day seven, but now the drug has been active in his system for the full week.

Bruce’s stomach is doing parkour the entire day, using his insides like a jungle gym.

He gets through his classes alright, has a nervous lunch with T’Challa, who is unsuccessful in trying to calm him down. Bruce doesn’t want to be calmed down. He’s excited. So excited. His cock keeps stirring and deflating the entire day. He’s going to get his mouth on Clint tonight. He’s going to give his first blowjob, and Clint is going to blow him, too.

Maybe Clint will lay back on the bed while he’s being sucked off, and Bruce can finger him while his mouth is filled with the archer’s cock. Will Clint get on his knees when he sucks Bruce? Bruce wouldn’t mind getting on his knees for Clint. Have Clint’s hand in his hair, guiding him along his length, groaning as Bruce pleasures him. Maybe he’ll whisper Bruce’s name between moans. Maybe he’ll shout it when he comes.

He’s useless in lab, and Shuri just sends him home after he spills lemonade on a skin sample.

He brushes his teeth and showers. He cleans himself out briefly. He’s not thorough, doesn’t need to be. He likes when Clint puts fingers in him, but he doesn’t think any full on ‘butt stuff’, as Clint so bluntly loves to call it, is going to happen.

Clint uses such crass language, all the time. Bruce is still getting used to it, and figures he might be for a while. Clint gives him a look whenever he uses the proper, clinical terms. Anal sex, penis (Clint very insistently trained him out of that one).

Bruce chuckles, soaps himself up under the warm spray and rubs the suds over his arms, his chest. It feels nice. When it’s Clint’s hands instead, it’ll feel even better.

His hair is still drying when he checks his email, smiling when a text from Clint flashes at the top of his screen.

C u soon big guy. gunna make u feel so fkkin good.

Bruce’s cock stirs again.

Wizard. He replies. His reflection on the screen is fuzzy, but his grin is clear. He feels Clint’s hands on him, constantly, on his face. Caressing his cheeks, thumbs tugging the ends of his lips up into a perpetual smile. Clint makes him smile.

He swipes back to his email and his eyes widen in a different excitement when he sees a new department chair is being nominated for Asgard’s Biomedical division. It’s about time. His eyes flick across the screen, searching, skimming, scanning. He’s heard a lot of chatter that he’s the top candidate. He doesn't want the position itself, too much paperwork and bureaucracy, but the job would give him more power a the college, and he might be able to get the funding he needs for his…

And so we are proud to extend this prestigious position to Dr. Samuel Sterns for his exemplary dedication to the advancement of Asgard’s academic community.

Samuel Sterns.

Samuel Sterns was nominated. Fucking Samuel Sterns.

Samuel Sterns is a weasel, a selfish prick who, brilliant as he is, only cares about winning awards. A conceited cheat who fucks over his colleagues every chance he gets.

It makes sense. Bruce is smarter than Sterns. Bruce is probably more qualified, from the objective standpoint. Bruce is also better with students and more liked by the community at large. Bruce’s science has more promise. But Sterns has awards. And tenure. So of course he’s getting the position.

Bruce loses himself. He feels it and he doesn’t. There’s a fire crawling up from his toes, his feet go numb as the searing shoots up his spine.

That familiar, horrible prickle manifests at his nape.

For a moment, a brief space between seconds, Bruce just feels sad. Not about Samuel Sterns, not about the position. Not about anything really. Just that he forgot what it was like, to feel this. The imminence of this experience before it happens. Knowing it’s here, an immovable force, and just being there to witness it. To fall victim to it. To know that there is no power to stop it.

With the little control he’s retained, he activates the voice feature on his Catcaller and screams at his phone to call T’Challa.

=============

Bruce wakes with a headache. No, not a headache. His head hurts. He must have hit it on something. His knuckles also feel sore, and they sting.

He hasn’t even opened his eyes before the tears start to fall. He’s leaking soblessly, like a defective faucet. Constant, sad, wet. The best handyman in the world couldn’t fix him.

“Deep breaths, my friend.” He calms slightly at that voice. T’Challa’s ever-steady, friendly, healing tone.

Bruce hates how aware he is. He knows. He knows what happened. He remembers every moment up to him calling T’Challa. Then darkness. Now he’s here. It’s worse, in a way, than if he did remember whatever inevitably horrible things happened during this episode. Losing time, knowing that there was pain in the space between. He hates it.

“I had an episode.” Bruce laments, closing his eyes again. He doesn’t want to look at T’Challa’s sympathetic face. Bruce is disgusting. He’s dangerous, a mindless juggernaut. An animal. He should be caged. He doesn’t deserve pity, let alone sympathy.

“You did.” T’Challa betrays no untoward emotion in his voice. He sounds so passive. Bruce doesn’t deserve him at the best of times. This isn’t the best of times. “I have redressed most of the damage. You did not harm much. It seems you were confined mostly to the lavatory before I arrived. You will need to replace your mirror and several toiletries. All of your toiletries. I would advice a new toilet seat as well. And a new shower curtain.”

Great. Bruce won’t even have the chance to clean up after his own mistakes. He appreciates the assessment of damage, though. It’s objective, factual. There are no empty assurances that everything is alright, no prying inquiries toward Bruce’s well-being. As much as Bruce hates lying, he hates being lied to even more.

Later, when Bruce is mostly patched up, refusing T’Challa’s light suggestion that he go to Urgent Care, he picks up his phone. A new phone, shiny and gleaming. T’Challa apparently has several spare devices in his vehicle, or maybe he just anticipated that Bruce would wreck his phone, and took the opportunity to replace it with a newer model, something he’d been trying to accomplish for a while now anyway. The data transfer took a couple minutes, and instantly, he receives several texts and four missed video call notifications.

Lol U used my word ;P Was the first one that came up, sent right after Bruce’s last message.

Omg im soooo excited.

Wya?

Bruce?

Brewski, where u at? Everything OK?

We don’t have to do stuff tonight if ur nervous. We can just hang

Talk to me dude.

R u OK??? Bruce I’m worried

Did I do something?

Dude call me!!!

The last text was mere minutes ago. He’s missed their date by four hours.

Bruce’s heart sinks. The tears aren’t leaking out now, they’re flowing, gushing viciously, they sting when a few tears fall on his raw knuckles, torn up from his assault on the bathroom earlier.

This is why.

This is why he was so worried before. This is why he kept his distance before. This is why he shouldn’t have every gone on that stupid date. Because he isn’t safe. Not even to himself, from himself.

What if the episode had come on later that night? What if it happened while he was with Clint? T’Challa understated the damage he’d done to the bathroom. It was a wreck. What if he’d hurt Clint in the same way?

With Clint, he could forget. He could forget he was broken, and made to break things. He could forget that no matter how much he “deserved” good things, there’s an even better reason why he can’t have them. Clint made him forget.

Bruce can’t forget. Never again. People need to be safe from him.

Clint makes him forget. So Clint has to go.

Conviction arises within him, built on a foundation of shattering sorrow, but standing strong. This is cruel, not how he wants things to happen. But cruel is what he needs, because anything less would be ineffective.

Clint has to go.

I’m sorry, but I can’t come over tonight. I don’t want to see you anymore. Goodbye.