Chapter Text
Yelena Belova was brazen, cool, quirky, and attractive. She really was – at least among other things - and she knew it. Despite all the abuse, all the violence, the gaslighting, the brainwashing, and the mind-control she had been through from such an early age and for so long, she remained a truly good-hearted person. She was optimistic, she was full of curiosity and will, she was strong, she was confident and skilled. She wanted to atone for Drevok’s sins – and she had. She wanted to move on – and she was.
While walking in Natasha’s steps, alongside the new Hawkeye, she still blazed her own path. She wasn’t the new Black Widow, she was the White Widow, as they called her now. She had her own style, her own standards, her own lifestyle, her own way of being. She had her own demons and her own way of fighting them. She radiated confidence and strength and awesomeness. She was bold, fun and confident.
That’s why Kate couldn’t hide her surprise, when, on a quiet Tuesday evening, she found Yelena, back home, pacing anxiously in the living room. Yelena never paced! Kate, being one of her closest friends, her closest person, her person – yes, she had sat Yelena in front of all the 22 seasons of Grey’s Anatomy – knew that Yelena had her dark thoughts and moments. (Who wouldn’t, after being through everything the widows had ?) More than once, Kate had felt her waking up abruptly from a nightmare. (Yelena never screamed, she had learned very early on, back when she was in the cold dormitory of the Red Room, to never make a sound.) More than once Kate had gotten home and found an empty flat left in a hurry. Yelena had a habit of isolating herself when things were hitting hard, and, while she was working on opening up a little, she always had to take some time alone first. But Kate had never seen Yelena pace like that. The former widow was always composed. Even when she had opened up to Kate about her earlier life, she had stayed composed. The stories had left Kate on the verge of tears, but Yelena had stayed composed – there were emotions written all over her, of course, but in such a small font, small details, that only a close one could decipher. Otherwise, Yelena was always composed. Or, at least, Kate had always seen Yelena composed.
“Hey! Are you okay?” Stupid question! Well done, Kate! Well done!
“I am okay, Kate Bishop”. Stupider answer, though. You’re fine, my ass!
“The floor might disagree.” Kate bite her tongue. She knew she shouldn’t push Yelena, especially not with sarcastic comments, but she was worried. And a worried Kate is a chatty Kate.
With a sigh, Yelena dropped down on the couch.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. The parquet is kind of a wuss, but it is sturdy.”
At that, Yelena snorted a little, and Kate too, let out a small smile.
“You, Kate Bishop, are in a good mood.”
“I am, in fact, just in the precise mood to listen to you, if you want to talk about what’s ob-viously bothering you.”
“How convenient is that !”
“I know right? I’m such a good friend!” Kate put on a pretentious face to go with her line, and Yelena snorted again, with a shake of her head.
That was a good sign, so Kate pushed her luck a bit more and sat next to her friend. There were a few beats of silence, but Kate didn’t mind. She usually found silences uncomfortable, but not around Yelena. Plus, the simple fact the other woman didn’t bolt through the window the moment Kate’s butt touched the sofa was already a win.
“Anastasia is getting married. You are invited too, by the way.”
Anastasia was the first widow Yelena had freed after cutting off things with Valentina, in the aftermath of the all Hawkeye and Christmas debacle, a year and a half earlier.
“Oh. Good for her! Did she call, or… ?”
“No, she announced it when I was at Alexei and Melina’s new place the other day.”
The two Russians had just settled back in Ohio, a couple of weeks ago, and Yelena, as well as some widows, had come to help with the moving. (Melina was the one who created the serum, but she was also the one who now synthesized the antidote, and she did take part in destroying the Red Room and killing Drekov, so…)
“That… That was like two weeks ago!”
“I know, I know… At first, I was just happy for her. I am happy for her!”
“But ?”
“But… I guess it made me wonder…about stuff… Stuffs like marriage, and falling in love, and relationship, and… Yeah, all that stuff.”
There was a beat of silence.
“I think I get it, you know.” Kate carefully said, trying to reengage the conversation.
“Do you ?”
“Back in college, everybody was having their first serious relationships, and I wasn’t. I wasn’t because I was busy training, going to competitions and everything, but sometimes… Well, sometimes, I was a bit jealous of their “normal” life. Especially when Greer and Franny got together. Or when practice didn't go as well as I would have wished, and I suddenly started questioning all my life choices. Okay, maybe not all of them, but you get the idea…”
“I do, Kate Bishop. And you may be right. There is a bit of that, I think. A bit of… Yes, a bit of jealousy.”
“It’s okay to be jealous, you know? It’s an emotion like any others, it’s as valid as any other feeling. Plus, it’s not like you’re acting all bitchy and mean because of it, so, you know, all good!”
“I know, Kate Bishop. But the issue is exactly that. I would not act bitchy or mean, as you said because deep down, I do not think I want it, want that life. I think I… I think I want to want it. I want to want it, but I do not actively want it. I do not actively seek it. That is what is annoying me. It does not make any sense, does it ?.”
“If it does to you, if verbalizing everything helps, then that’s what matters. But I think it still does make sense to me, in some way? If you’re feeling up to it, some further explanations wouldn’t be too much, though.”
Once again, there was a beat of silence. Yelena seemed lost in thoughts.
The sun was gently setting down on New York City. It was a nice evening of June.
“I’ve never… Under Drevok’s serum, everything, every thought, every feeling, every emotion, every desire, was completely toned down, numbed, erased. We were not empty shells. Not totally. The thoughts, the feelings, the emotions, were still there, somewhere, but they were muffled, silenced, reduced to a mere white noise in the background. It was like… like… I don’t know…” Another beat of silence. “Like, if my body was a car, then I, the Widow, Drekov’s tool, was at the wheel, but I, the real me, was strapped in the backseat. I was there, but I was not. But I also was. It is… It is not what matters. What matters is that I’ve retaken the wheel, right ?”
“That, you did!”
“But, what if… What if I, in fact, did not ?”
“What do you mean? You did Yelena, you did! You… You were freed from the serum, you destroy Drevok and the Red Room, and you freed all the other widows. You have at least ten jackets with a ton lots of pockets. You’re working with the free widows to develop a protection network for women and children all around the world – which is awesome, by the way. I’m like super, super, proud of you! You put so much hot sauce on your mac-and-cheese, that it should literally be illegal. You go to Bucky’s therapist on a regular-ish basis. You have a dog! One and a half dog, even, because, let’s face it, Lucky is half yours, by now! You… You are free Yelena! What… What makes you think otherwise ?”
“What… What if the serum had broken me, in a more… irreparable way? Like, what if… what if it broke a part of me, a part of what makes me human, a… What if the serum broke a part of me and it couldn’t be repaired? What if, beyond the grave and despite everything you said, Drekov still prevented me from enjoying the human experience to its fullest? What if he still robbed me of a total freedom, yet again ?”
Kate frowned. She wanted so badly to object – because no, Yelena wasn’t broken! No matter what was bothering her exactly, she wasn’t broken. Yes, she still had her traumas, she’d probably have them for the remaining of her life. She still had some of her old habits, reflexes, and conditioning, engrained deep inside her, but she wasn’t broken. And more than anything, she wasn’t less than human! Kate wanted so badly to say all that, but she wasn’t sure to know exactly what the assassin was talking about, and therefore, feared to derive from the actual topic or saying something the wrong way.
“Are you referring to something in particular or… ?”
To her surprise, she saw Yelena’s cheeks reddening a little. Yelena didn’t pace, and Yelena surely didn’t blush! Did she? Despite her apparent embarrassment, the White Widow still blurted :
“Love. Sex.”
Oh. Oooooooh. Oh?
It was a critical moment. Kate, and while it definitively wasn’t one of her strong suits, forced herself to stay composed. Don’t show any reaction! Don’t show any reaction! She felt Yelena on edge. The assassin was ready to bolt, to flee, to cut everybody out, but Kate wouldn’t let that happen. Don’t show anything!
“I… At first, I never really gave it much thought. There was so much to do, and so much to see. So many widows to free, so much time to catch up with my sister and Alexei and Melina. Then, I was blipped, so it complicated everything even more. So yeah, I didn’t give it many thoughts. I take care of myself when I need to, and it’s not like celibacy is weighing on me or something. I’m used to being alone, to some extent I even like it. Plus now, I’m surrounded by people I like, or, you know, tolerate, so…”
“What changed, then ?”
“I guess, I began seeing that romantic and sexual relationships are, in fact, way more important than I first thought. I mean… I always saw Barton and Laura as the disgustingly boring old couple, but, I guess I have just realized now how it is such an important goal for so many people. I mean, look at Greer and Franny, or Peter and MJ. So much pinning on his part, when she did not even see him, it was disgusting… But now they are together/back together, and…”
Kate bite her tongue to not argue that, if anything, she wasn’t looking for anyone or worse pinning after anyone, but 1- that would have been a lie. She was pinning hard after Yelena. 2- Yelena would definitively bring up the Sofia Incident.
The Sofia Incident… A couple of months ago, Yelena had gone rescuing the last widow, and while Kate had wanted to go with her, as she had done a few times already, some domestic crime-fighting affair had tied her to the city. After a particularly hard night (and definitively not because she was missing Yelena), she went for a drink and somehow ended up taking a blonde stranger named Sofia back to her apartment. Except Yelena had been back earlier than anticipated.
“But I don’t feel it. I don’t… I don’t feel sexually attracted to people… I… I just don’t. That in itself was a weird discovery, I guess, but, I just put it on the trauma, you know.”
Despite herself, Kate frowned a little.
“I may not be attracted to people, and I may be a master at killing, but sometimes, some targets still required a certain closeness, to be able to kill them in certain ways, that may have been asked of us. Being women, and most of our target being men, well…”
It took Kate a few seconds to grasp what Yelena was implying, but, when she did, she couldn’t mask her horror.
“Oh my god! I’m sorry Yelena, I…” Didn’t know… And she didn’t. Not explicitly, at least, but it wasn’t such a big surprise either. Bad guys are bad guys for a reason.
“It’s okay, Kate Bishop - ”
It’s really not.
“- Plus, I was not the one they typically sent, for that kind of missions. I wasn’t the right fit, I guess. Wasn’t what those men wanted, wasn’t attractive enough.”
“That’s bullshit, you’re beautiful, Yelena!”
The moment the words left her mouth, Kate mentally slapped herself. What an idiot, Bishop! And now, she was the one furiously blushing.
“Not that I would have wished that you had been the one typically sent on those missions! Nobody should! I…”
Kate nearly jumped out of the couch. She needed to get a grip! She needed to get a grip now! Why was she the one freaking out, when it was Yelena who had been having a melt-down not half an hour earlier. Get a grip, Bishop!
“If that chat is making you uncomfortable, we can stop, Kate Bishop.”
Kate turned on her heels, facing Yelena. She was as composed as ever, except Kate could see the uncertainty and the pain in her eyes. She immediately went back to the couch.
“I believe we stopped at the part where you explained that this lack of attraction might come from the trauma.”
Yelena stared at her for a few seconds. Then, a small smile stretched the corner of her lips – it was a very small and almost shy smile, full of gratitude and... Was that embarassement ?
“We did. And that is indeed what I thought. It wasn’t a good feeling, far from it, but there was something comforting about it as well. Because, if it is trauma, it can still, to some ex-tent, and with time and a lot of therapy I do not feel myself doing right now, be healed. It’s not completely final. It’s just one more crack to my damaged self, a crack that could, once again, be filled, be fixed, at least to a point. The other comforting thing about it was that, like for many of my other traumas, most of the other widows must have it, right? But, they do not. They do not, Kate Bishop.-”
At that point, and for the first time, Kate heard Yelena voice’s crack, and it broke her heart a little bit more.
“-Anastasia is getting married, and from what we all heard that night, she does not refrain from the physical part of the relationship. And apparently, other widows also have boyfriends or girlfriends! And one-night stands. And some are even ‘friends-with-benefits’ or something.”
Yelena Belova was rarely out of breath. Right now, she was very close. So close it physically hurt Kate, who had to refrain from hugging the hell out of the other woman. She knew her well enough to know it wasn’t what she needed right now.
“It’s… I’m not an expert on anything, but, being bi myself, I did dive a little into the LGBTQ+ community, and, while I wouldn’t be able to go into heavy details on the topic, much to my regret, I am, however, sure that there is a term for what you’re describing. It’s…”
“Asexual. And aromantic. Possibly. I know.”
Faced with Kate's surprised face, Yelena couldn’t help but snort:
“I do know how to use the internet, Kate Bishop. In fact, I know the Dark Web like the back of my hand.”
“Yeah… Well…Anyway! See, you’re not broken, Yelena. It’s a thing other people experience. It’s not just a trauma response, a disease, or being broken.”
“Actually… The lack of sexual or romantic attraction is still, to this day, in the DSM. The only thing is an amendment, from 2013 I believe, saying that, if the person defines themselves as asexual or aromantic, their lack of attraction is no longer a medical or psychological concern. The thing is, I don’t know if I am asexual or aromantic. And I definitively don’t feel comfortable with any of that. I just feel… broken. Robbed.”
This time, Kate couldn’t help herself and reached out to Yelena, squeezing her hand. To her surprise, Yelena squeezed back, eyes glued to the floor, refusing to face Kate.
“Did… Do you want to talk to your therapist, about it? Maybe she…”
“No.”
“Okay.”
Kate felt like she should keep quiet, let the tension decrease a little, but, then, Yelena squeezed her hand harder. She was positively clinging to it. A lifeline in a storm.
“Why ? Why don't you want to talk to Doctor I-forgot-her-name?”
Yelena could have invoked a number of reasons, which would have all been true. For so long, she had been taught and forced to never trust anyone, to never open up, to never show any kind of weakness, that talking about such intimate details and thoughts was, on a frighteningly literal level, impossible. But there was also another reason for that:
“Because… Because I think… I also don’t think it’s trauma. I don’t think it can be healed or fixed.”
Yelena sighted, defeated. Yelena was never defeated!
“You know… When I first realized I might be bisexual, I… I freaked out. Massively. I’m not sure exactly why. I mean, my mother, for all her flaws, isn’t homophobic. Neither are or were my closest friends. I guess there were still the high society’s expectations of marrying male, rich and white… But it’s not like, already back then, I didn’t do all I could to show them how much I disliked their stupid rules and prejudices. But I still freaked out, despite having no actual reason to do so. So, I pushed it down, I ignored it. Deep down, I knew it wasn’t “just a phase”, I knew it wasn’t something to fix. But I couldn’t face it. At that time, I just couldn’t. So, I ignored it, the best I could. Throwing myself into archery and fangirling over Hawkeye, mostly. It may not have been the healthiest way to cope, but… Then, one day, I felt a bit more ready, I started thinking about it more seriously, researching and experimenting a little. Once again, it may not have been my brightest, or even happiest, moments, and I may or may not die of liver-related disease because of it, but… And one day, I just felt ready and secure enough to come out. ‘Yay! Way to go, Kate Bishop’, you’ll say –“
“I would not say that.” said Yelena, with an offended face, but a small smile to brighten it a little.
“Tut! I’m monologuing! Where was I ? Yes ! 'Yay! Way to go Kate Bishop!' Except, a few months after, despite being out and proud, and feeling so great and confident about myself, I had my first relationship with a girl. Her name was Susan, she was a lesbian, and an art student, and I think I fell in love with her – as much as a 17-year-old can fall in love. I keep fond memories of those few months we were together, she was awesome and we had some amazing times, but I also remember thinking: what if I’m not actually bi, but a lesbian? What if I’ve been lying to myself all this time? What if I still conformed to heteronormativity, by leaving myself an out for male validation, for a “normal” lifestyle? Do I need to do another coming out? I’m a walking cliché! What will people think? So yeah, I freaked out, again. Again!”
Kate grimaced comically on the last word, earning an exasperated snort from Yelena.
“I guess, what I’m trying to say, is that, first of all, and despite what the DSM says, there may not be such a clear cut between pathology and sexual orientation. Not being sure or comfortable yet, doesn’t mean there is necessarily something wrong with you. Second of all, it is okay to not be comfortable or sure yet. It is okay to freak out-“
“I do not freak out. I never freak out, Kate Bishop!”
“Okay, sorry, sorry. But just so you know, it is also okay to freak out! Anyway! It is okay to…be moved and shook by those thoughts and questions. And, if you’re not ready yet, it is okay to take your time to figure all these things out. In fact, take all the time you need. Plus, while it wasn’t what happened for me personally, it is okay to be wrong, it is okay to change your mind on how you identify, and it is okay for your thoughts, feelings, or desires to evolve. Just as it is okay for those feelings, thoughts, desires, as well as for your identity, to, on the contrary, stay the same. It’s valid. You’re valid, Yelena Belova. You’re valid, and you’re free and you’re strong and brave, and beautiful, and…” Kate, blushing like a tomato, was now glad Yelena was still avoiding her gaze. “And no one will ever take that away from you again. Not even yourself. Or I’ll kick their butt. Hard.”
At that, Yelena snorted, and muttered something (probabaly "as if you could kick my ass"). Her hand was still gripping Kate’s, though her fingers were beginning to relax a little.
“And, if you ever need someone to talk to, I’m here. I’m here for you. Also, I know you said you knew how to use the internet, which I am very aware of thank you very much, but, just in case, Reddit and Tiktok really helped me, when I was figuring myself out. And if, on the other hand, you just need to relax and forget about all of that, at least for now, I’m pretty sure Brooklyn-99's spin off is on tonight.”
Once again, there was a beat of silence.
“Thank you, Kate Bishop.”