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After years of not being able to feel her, let alone see her, or touch her, Natasha can’t help the stutter of her heart as she wraps her arms around Wanda’s neck in a hold so tight it could rival a headlock.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” Natasha’s voice cuts through the air in a whisper, the roughness betraying her always-cool façade and how hard she’s trying not to break down in tears. Because they did it. They did it; they brought everyone back, they defeated Thanos, and they won.
They won, they won, they won.
Did they?
Her hold on Wanda tightens impossibly as her mind runs a thousand miles per second with all the events that had led up to this very moment. She thinks of Wakanda, how she watched the love of her life blow a hole through her best friend’s head, how she could see the pain in her eyes and feel it as her own when time moved backwards and she realized what she did had meant nothing; she thinks of the years to come, all the hurt, the emptiness, the falling back into old habits (she still can’t decide if they’re healthy, if they ever were (probably not), as she stares back at the handcuffs locked around one of the bars of her headboard, and the pointe shoes, that once resided in an untouched box inside her closet, now neatly placed on the corner of the room next to the doorframe); she thinks of Steve’s company throughout the years, the finality of his voice (“Whatever it takes.”), all of their hands brought together in a circle as they embark on a mission they’d soon find out was way over their heads; she thinks of Vormir, how ready she was to die, to give up her life because she never stopped fighting, never stopped looking, everything she did for five years brought her here and whatever it takes, right?; she thinks of Clint’s body lying at the bottom of a cliff, pale and lifeless (that was her goddamn best friend and she couldn’t save him), how she has no idea how she’s going to break the news to Laura and Cooper and Lila and Nathaniel; she thinks of Tony, his burnt body and unfocused eyes as Pepper’s voice was the only disruption in the silence (“It’s okay, you can rest now,”), how she heard Peter’s desperate cries cut through the calmness and nothingness that had settled around them (“We won, Mr. Stark. Please…”). She thinks and she thinks and she thinks, and she can’t help but wonder: if they won, why doesn’t it feel like it?
But when she feels Wanda’s hands move up and down her back in a soothing manner, lips pressed against her temple and moving and grounding her as she whispers sweet nothings and shhh, it’s okay and i missed you so much and i love you as tears make their way onto her suit and slide all the way to the ground, Natasha thinks maybe she can deal with the hurt, the grief and the guilt, so big and strong and overwhelming, that was threatening to swallow her whole.
And when she feels Wanda pull away from the embrace just enough to bring their foreheads together, her eyes bright red as she projects calm, love and sunshine into her mind and body, hands trembling slightly as fingertips caress her cheek lovingly before she leans forward and their lips fall into the most gentle of kisses, Natasha thinks that, as long as they have each other, they’re going to be okay.