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“It’s not that bad,” Steve Rogers said, looking at the article Peter was showing him on his phone. “Trust me, you should have seen some of the stuff they were writing in the papers about me back in the 40s.”
“Yeah, but that was years before…” Cassie paused, scrolling straight to the comments, “ThanosWasRight69 could troll the internet saying the reason we sucked was because there’s too many women on the team.”
The Avengers, both new and old, were all lounging in the main common room that proved to be a popular hangout for them all, as they settled into their little found family routine that had naturally formed. The area was spacious, designed by Tony Stark himself (Of course), with multiple comfy corner piece sofas, a large flat screen television for when they held movie nights, and a kitchen piece that doubled as a bar. The right side of the room was supported with ceiling to floor windows that Yelena often found herself spending much of her free time meditating in front of, enjoying all weathers whether it be from feeling the warm rays of the sun bask her skin or listening to the soothing sounds of a thunderstorm.
Her girlfriend, Kate Bishop, had tried to meditate with her a few times but they often found themselves getting distracted once the archer’s lack of patience got the better of her.
Yelena remembered the first time this had happened during a session one lazy Sunday afternoon.
“I don’t think I'm doing it right.” Yelena heard Kate say five minutes into their meditation. The blonde girl had her eyes closed but couldn’t focus because of the archers inability to stop fidgeting and taking dramatic huffs of breath.
“Meditating does not usually involve this much talking,” Yelena breathed deeply before exhaling, her eyes still closed. “See?”
“I don’t think I'm built for this.” Kate huffed before closing her eyes again.
“You just need to relax, Kate Bishop,” Yelena asked but then found herself rolling her closed eyes when the brunette shuffled for the millionth time. “If you do not enjoy meditating then why are you here?”
“Because…” Kate said, stretching her legs out and leaning back on her elbows. “I like spending time with you.”
“That is fair,” Yelena sighed in agreement “I am good company.”
Kate peaked one of her eyes open to look at Yelena, who had a content smile on her face. Many people, before getting to know her, often thought the assassin had a ‘resting bitch face’. In reality, however, after spending many months with the woman, Kate knew that this was her candid resting face. This was how Yelena looked with her guard down, completely relaxed, at ease and Kate wondered to herself how she had managed to score the most breath-taking person she had ever laid eyes on.
With a mischievous grin on her face, Kate opened her other eye and abandoned any intentions to keep meditating as she moved from her position to get closer to the girl who was still focused on her breathing. Settling herself in a position behind the girl she pulled the long blonde hair that had naturally fallen over to one side and began peppering light kisses along her shoulder and neck before sucking on a pulse point just below her ear lobe, just how she knew Yelena liked.
“Kate Bishop,” Yelena hummed, trying to sound annoyed but failed as she struggled to focus on anything other than the brunette's mouth on her skin. “What are you doing?”
“I’m helping you relax,” Kate murmured against her skin. “This is much more fun.”
Yelena was about to make a weak protest that she really did want to get back to meditation but then Kate’s hand found Yelena’s cheek and turned her face towards her whilst simultaneously kissing up at her jaw, then the corner of her mouth, before finally landing softly on her mouth, causing all thoughts other than archer’s touch to disappear. Yelena turned, resting her hands on the brunette's hips, deepening the kiss.
“We can stop,” Kate teased and pulled back, causing Yelena to frown at the lack of contact, and looked at the assassin with a playful glint in her eyes. “If you want to go back to what you were doing?”
One of Yelena’s hands worked its way seductively up Kate’s hip, past her breast, and stopped against her shoulder. The next thing Kate knew she was being flipped and pinned against the floor as Yelena straddled her, taking both of her hands and holding them down above her head.
“You are a terrible influence, Kate Bishop,” Yelena smirked as she lent down at Kate, teasing the archer as she refused the kiss Kate attempted to steal from her. “What will I do with you now?”
“I have some ideas.” Kate all but whimpered as she looked at her girlfriend with lust-filled eyes that silently begged for her to do something, anything to help subdue the heat that was rising in her.
“Do you now?” Yelena hummed.
Yelena, seeing her girlfriend consumed in this state of passion and need, figured she had suffered enough and reconnected their lips in a heated kiss. The blonde immediately deepened the kiss as she opened her mouth against the archers, her tongue parting Kate’s, who moaned in approval. Five minutes later, the archer and assassin could have given Quicksilver a run for his money with how quick they were in getting to their bedroom, with no thoughts of meditation on their mind.
Since then, Yelena has been reluctant to actually allow the other girl to join her in her sessions because whenever they did it was impossible for it not to end in sex.
“You’ll get the misogynistic comments no matter what you do,” Natasha said to Cassie, stirring Yelena from her thoughts. “Trust me, I know.”
“Who wrote the article?” Shuri asked whilst focusing on the game of chess she was playing against Peter.
“It was that guy, J. Jonah Jameson,” Peter said, moving his bishop to take one of Shuri’s Pawns. “you know, the editor-in-chief for The Daily Bugle?”
“He is the one who keeps coming after you, yes?” Yelena asked Peter, who often did receive more of a backlash from the publisher who for some reason harboured a massive grudge against Spider-Man.
“Yeah,” Peter sighed. “He’s obsessed with unmasking me, it's so annoying.”
Peter, unlike the rest of the new avengers, preferred to keep his mask on to protect his identity. Yelena understood wanting to have a degree of anonymity but could not hack having to wear a mask every time they went out on the field for an assignment, it just did not seem worth it, not to mention the itching she imagined Peter endured. Not practical.
Yelena opened her phone and took a look at the article herself, gasping dramatically. “I am not a low budget Natasha Romanoff, I am far too talented to be considered low budget. If anything, I am high budget!”
“Fake news.” Cassie agreed, blowing a raspberry at the article and throwing her phone on her lap.
“You’re all taking this way too seriously,” Kate said in a chilled manner whilst she fixed a new string onto her bow. “It’s like they say, if you can’t handle the heat, get out of the kitchen.”
“This Jameson man just called you the weakest avenger.” Yelena stated simply, waiting and counting mentally three, two, one-
“What!” Kate shouted, abandoning her bow to come over to where Yelena was sitting. “Let me see this article.”
Yelena raised her phone above her head, which Kate collected.
“The new Hawkeye has provided further supporting evidence to the argument that a bow and arrow does not make you a superhero, get a real job!” Kate quoted the article, feeling a mix of anger and insecurity.
“Yeah that’s something you’re gonna have to get used to, Katie-Kat,” Clint laughed. “Don’t believe everything they say in those articles they just want to make a couple of bucks from a few clicks.”
“Oh my god.” Kate said, ignoring Clint’s comment, eyes still glued to The Daily Bugle article.
“What?” Yelena asked, craning her neck to look up at her girlfriend who was still standing behind her. “What does it say?”
Kate’s look of anger melted into an uncontrollable giggle as she raised her hand to her mouth to stifle the laugh while she recited the article. “The most interesting thing about the new Hawkeye is her budding romance with Spider-Man who, as seen pictured below, seems to be caring more about their feelings for each other than they do protecting the fine citizens of New York City.”
“What!” Yelena and Peter said simultaneously. Peter groaned into his hands whilst Yelena couldn’t stop herself from feeling a pang of jealousy.
“This photographer has really made it look like you two are banging.” Cassie said, laughing with Shuri who nearly spat out her drink when she saw it.
“That is not a mental image I needed this morning but here we are.” Tony said sipping his coffee before leaving to return back to his lab.
“Let me see this picture.” Yelena said bitterly to Kate who lent down to show her.
Surely enough, the picture had made it out to look as though the archer and Spider-man were romantically involved. If Yelena had cared for photography she would have probably acknowledged that it was a very good snap, but all she could see is her girlfriend looking lovingly into the eyes of Spider-man. They had been caught mid-air, as the archer had her arms wrapped around his neck whilst he swung them to safety. In reality, what had happened was Kate had fallen off a building after an attempt to shield herself from an explosion that had been launched in her direction by the two super soldiers they were fighting. They had attempted to remove the marksman from the fight, finding her trick arrows were slowing them down and threatening to prevent them from completing their assignment. As Kate dodged the explosion, the impact had knocked the brunette off the tall building. The “star-struck” look on the archers face, this photographer had captured, was really just her processing that fact that she, you know, fell off a roof and did not plummet to her death, but whoever snapped this was probably making thousands right now off of selling the story of an Avengers romance.
“Don’t worry,” Kate lent down to whisper to Yelena, noticing the scowl the Russian had on her face. “I still love you the most.”
Natasha chuckled to herself as she saw Yelena’s scowl soften at the girl's words and the soft peck she had placed on her cheek, before turning her attention to a groaning Peter, still mortified.
“How am I gonna explain this to MJ?” He said into his hands.
“MJ is incredibly intelligent,” Shuri assured. “I am sure she already knows.”
“Team,” Steve said, gaining their attention. “You’re in the public sphere now, you’re going to see all sorts of rumours about you but it’s all worth it to protect this place we call home.”
Natasha jokingly rolled her eyes at Captain America’s cheesiness but couldn’t help but find herself nodding in approval. “Steve’s right, you can’t stop the media from making shit up.”
After a couple more comments joking about Kate and Peter as a couple, to the silent dismay of Yelena, the new Avengers decided to try and forget all about the bad article and train in the gym, practising some new equipment Shuri had been working on.
-
Much later into the day, when everyone had settled down to do their own thing, Yelena found herself sitting in her usual spot on her yoga mat in front of the windows. She was trying to get an hour or so of meditation in to relax herself before going off to find out whatever trouble her girlfriend was getting herself into. She struggled to focus, however, failing to get that damn picture of Kate and Peter out of her head. She knew she was being dumb and so she stopped herself from talking about it with anyone, knowing they would say what has already been said, that it was all nonsense.
And she believed it too, so why could she not shift the pangs of jealousy that she felt in her heart when she thought of that picture. She knew Kate loved her, she told the blonde girl basically every day and definitely every night before they went to sleep. Huffing to herself, Yelena opened her eyes and looked at the sunset that had started to set over the tree’s, causing a beautiful pink glow in the clouds. The lights in the common room were off and so there was only a natural orange glow reflecting into the room, just how Yelena liked it. She found herself stirred from her thoughts when she sensed somebody enter the room and immediately could tell from the soft footsteps that it was Kate.
“I knew you’d be here,” Kate said as she sat down next to Yelena. “Peter’s asking if people want to go out and get some ice cream, wanna come?”
Yelena hummed and closed her eyes, reacting slightly petty to the mention of Peter’s name.
“Hey, what's up?” Kate said, noticing the other girl's mood.
Yelena sighed and opened her eyes and Kate could swear she could see a glimmer of insecurity before she blinked and became unreadable again. “It is nothing.”
“Hey,” Kate said again, tilting Yelena’s chin so that they were looking at each other. “We don’t do that, remember. Tell me what's up?”
When Yelena and Kate had first gotten to know each other the archer had learned very quickly that the assassin often kept herself guarded like an impenetrable fortress, much unlike Kate Bishop, who was an open book and very easy to read.
“Really, it is nothing.” Yelena sighed before admitting. “Just that dumb picture of you and Parker.”
“Yelena,” Kate said, already deduced that it probably had something to do with that. “You know none of that’s real.”
“I know,” Yelena agreed. “But it makes me very angry that people think you are with him and not me.”
“You would hate to go public with our relationship.” Kate said. “Not to mention how dangerous that information could be to our enemies.”
Once, following a very stressful fight, Kate sought comfort in the other girl and reached for Yelena’s hand in a very public setting with multiple news reporters. Yelena had rejected Kate’s gesture, however, and after following a very sulky Kate back home had explained to her when they were alone that they can not allow to make themselves vulnerable in their line of work. If one of their enemies were to correctly interpret exactly what the two avengers meant to each other it could cause them to become targets. This proposed a threat that Yelena, who suspected she had many more enemies than Kate, could not and would not put her at risk of. Kate listened to Yelena and begrudgingly agreed that it was for the best for them to not be so open for once.
“I know,” Yelena said again. “I guess I am just a bit jealous is all.”
Kate smirked and wrapped her arms around the other girl. “You? Jealous of Peter?”
“Well, whilst he is not for me I am not blind, Kate Bishop,” Yelena said. “Peter Parker is not exactly unattractive.”
“He is not for me either!” Kate chuckled and planted soft kisses on her cheek. “I love him to bits but he’s like my baby brother.”
“Really?” Yelena couldn’t believe that she actually asked that. How needy she thought to herself.
“Yes! It would be gross.” Kate reassured. “Besides, I only have eyes for you.”
“Very smooth, Kate Bishop.” Yelena said but felt herself smile as she felt a wave of relief wash over her. It felt good to hear this from Kate.
“Can I join you?” Kate asked after a minute or so cuddling. “I promise I'll let you focus.”
“You should not make promises you cannot keep.” Yelena laughed. “Let us just skip to the good bit, yes?”
Kate smiled and bit her lip before pulling the blonde by her shirt into a heated kiss.