Chapter Text
New York, Avengers Tower; present
Steve had called Clint and the rest of the Avengers for a special team meeting. Something about his lifelong friend coming back from the dead. Clint was already annoyed because Steve had decided to call this meeting at seven in the morning and if there is something that Clint’s not, it's a morning person.
When he arrived the others were already there looking as fresh as always. Clint on the other hand had decided to put on some sweatpants and his purple t-shirt. On his way there he had grabbed a cup of coffee to wake him up a bit more, because he needed it. He made his way over to Natasha who was standing in the back corner of the room.
“Glad you could make it, Hawkeye.” she said with a small grin on her face.
“Yeah, yeah, let’s just get this over with. It’s way too early for this.. for anything for that matter.” He mumbled while taking another sip of his coffee.
“Steve and Bucky should be here any minute and then you can go back to bed.” Natasha said, slightly mocking him.
“ Bucky , really? What kind of stupid name is Bucky?” Clint snorted behind his mug. That comment resulted in Natasha punching him on his shoulder, making Clint spill his coffee.
“Ow, what was that for?! And hey that was my coffee!”
She punched him again.
“Hey, would you stop that?” Clint said while stroking the shoulder she had just punched twice.
“Steve is really excited about this, so try to keep the insults to yourself, okay?”
Clint rolled his eyes at that. “Okay, mom. ” he said, sounding as sarcastic as usual.
The other Avengers were sitting around the table just talking with each other, when the door opened and Steve Rogers stepped in. The whole room fell silent and everyone focused on Captain America waiting to hear his big announcement and the introduction of Bucky Barnes.
“Hey, thank you for meeting me this early,-” Clint rolled his eyes at that, still annoyed that he had to get out of bed for this. “-but we just came back from Wakanda and I wanted
him to meet all of you.” Like Natasha had said earlier Steve looked really excited to introduce Bucky.
“He doesn’t remember a lot, but he’s getting better and he wants to interact with new people again.”
Clint wasn’t really paying attention to any of this until he saw Bucky walking into the room. He froze. This Bucky fella was actually The Winter Soldier. The Winter Soldier was Steve Rogers, Captain America’s lifelong best friend.
“I’m very glad to be able to tell you that he’s finally back!” Steve said as he swung his arm around Bucky, Winter Soldier as Clint knew him , who was visibly still uncomfortable in this situation.
All of the sudden Clint felt overwhelmed.
He’s back.
Those were the only words that went around in his head and no matter how hard he tried that was the only thing he could think about. All those years and now he’s finally back.
Ever since it happened he had always been looking over his shoulder for him. Trying his hardest to avoid him and or out run The Soldier or ‘Bucky’ as he now went by apparently. Clint had never tried to avoid anything more in his entire life and now Steve of all people had led The Soldier straight to him.
So now after all these years, he had finally come back for Clint. He dropped his mug which broke immediately when it hit the ground. Coffee spilled all over the floor and everyone startled and turned their eyes to Clint almost instantly. He stood still and he felt his hands starting to shake. His face looked white as a ghost and his face was expressionless.
“Barton, are you okay?” Steve asked from across the room.
Clint started to panic, his eyes scanning across the room over and over again for a way to escape.
“Clint?” Natasha tried softly when he didn’t respond the first time. He got confused and questioning looks from everyone in the room and the panic started to become worse. He was sweating now and he needed to get out of this room.
“I- I, uh.. I gotta go-” Clint stammered barely audible and stalked out of the room as fast as he could, not seeing everyone looking after him.
He didn’t think. Couldn’t think, he just walked as fast as he could. He had to get as far away from him as possible. Clint found himself in the bathroom leaning over the sink. He looked up in the mirror still feeling his heart beating heavily in his chest. His forehead was dripping with sweat. He turned on the water tap and splashed some water on his face to try and cool himself down when he heard someone in the hallways.
“CLINT? WHERE ARE YOU?”
It was Natasha screaming in the hallways trying to find him. Ofcours she went after him, Clint didn’t really expect anything else from his partner. Then he heard a knock on the bathroom door.
“Clint? Are you in here?” he heard from the other side of the door.
“Go away Nat, I don’t want to talk about it.” he responded
He wasn’t even remotely surprised when she came in anyway. He didn’t turn to look at her and kept staring down at the sink, letting the water drip down his face.
“What happened out there?” Natasha asked him.
“I told you, I don't want to talk about it.” Clint was getting frustrated and just wanted to be left alone.
But Natasha being Natasha, she didn’t give up on this conversation and he knew that she wanted some kind of acceptable answer from him.
“Was is Barnes? I thought you’d never even met The Winter Soldier before today.”
Clint remained silent.
“Have you?!”
Clint swallowed hard and finally decided to turn around and face his partner. The same fear and panic from before was still all over his face and it made Natasha give him a sympathetic look. He forced himself to look down, not wanting to face Natasha while he was feeling as vulnerable as ever while trying to keep a tear from rolling over his face.
“Talk to me, Clint, I wanna help.”
The next moment Clint snapped.
“But you can’t, okay? You can’t! This man ruined my life and I can’t just come back from that.” Making eye contact with her at the last part.
He was taken a little back by his outburst and so was Natasha, because she also looked a bit surprised. Clint doesn’t usually snap like that. He took a step back and widend the already existing distance between him and Natasha.
“When did this happen?” She asked him carefully, making sure not to stress Clint more than he already was.
Clint looked down again, guilt started to get to him. The mission on which it had happened was actually with Natasha and he had lied to it about her. Made up some story to keep her from finding out what had really happened. He didn’t dare to tell her. He just couldn’t.
“Remember Russia?” he almost whispered.
“Russia? But you said-” she looked confused.
“I know what I said, Nat. I lied.” he looked guilty and still refused to make eye contact, not willing to face the judgement in her face.
“Jesus Clint.. that was Barnes? You could’ve told me, you know that right?” she said, still giving him that sympathetic look that he hated.
Clint felt stuck. He didn’t know what to say. Ofcours he could just tell her the full truth, but he wasn’t ready for that. At least not yet. So he decided to push all of his sadness away as he hardened his face.
“Look I didn’t want to talk about it back then and I don’t want to talk about it now. So just let it go, okay?” The words came out harsher than he had intended but it made his point come across.
For the second time that day he stormed out of a room, only this time he knew where he was going. He walked towards his room and locked the door behind him. He sunk down to the ground against the door and covered his face with his hands. This day turned out nothing to be like he expected and it was definitely not in a good way. Not a good way at all.
For what felt like hours he just sat there against the door with his head in his hands. Until he heard a knock against the door, which was met with a frustrated groan. He didn’t even tell the person to go away and kept himself quiet. It was probably Natasha again and he really didn’t feel like talking to her. Again .
After a while he heard a soft voice on the other side of the door, which definitely was not Natasha’s.
“Clint? Are you okay in there?”
It was Wanda.
“We were worried about you because you left earlier today. I just wanted to check up on you.”
Clint sighed. He really didn’t feel like talking, but he didn’t want to leave her outside like that. Slowly he stood up and unlocked the door. When he opened it he met Wanda’s concerned but sweet face.
“Hey” she greeted him with a soft voice and a small smile.
“Hi” is all Clint said back. He tried to force a smile on his face, but that didn’t really work.
He walked towards his bed and instead of sitting or laying on it, he decided to sit against the bed on the floor with his knees up to his face.
Wanda slowly followed him and joined him on the floor, taking a seat next to him.
“Are you okay?”
“Not really.” Clint had always tried to be stronger for her, to not let her see him as vulnerable as he is right now. But he couldn’t hide it and wasn’t really in the mood to pretend.
“Wanna talk about it?” She asked, not wanting to push him.
“No.” He answered. It wasn’t a hard no. It sounded tired and was almost a whisper.
“Okay” Was all she said. Just like him, Wanda started at the wall in front of them. They had done this before. Just sitting together was enough sometimes. He started doing it after they met in Sokovia to comfort her. That didn’t always mean talking. Them being together was enough to know that he cared for her. And now Wanda was doing the same thing, just being there for him without asking any questions. He’ll tell her someday, but not now, not today.
After a while they both fell asleep. Wanda had leaned her head over on his shoulder and Clint had leaned over to her. It looked so peaceful, but the minute Clint fell asleep he was back in Russia..
Back with The Winter Soldier..