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It’s a simple information retrieval. Or, rather, it was meant to be, but when does a mission ever go along with plan A? Natahsa will admit that, maybe, the presence of Maria in the field with her in the first place might suggest that the stunt wasn’t that simple, but they’re the best the world has seen. Even impossible is easy to them.
Even still, if you’d told her that she’d be working cases in the field with Maria at her side when she first joined, she’d probably have laughed. It was honestly a fight not to when Maria set the idea down herself, but Maria isn’t one to joke so easily about a job and Natasha isn’t one to turn down any. Even if it seems far too good to be true.
It’s safe to say, in her entire time working for her, that Natasha hadn’t ever really expected to stumble into the nearest safe house with Maria close on her heels.
Maria hadn’t either, for what it’s worth. The decision had been somewhat last minute, and she can’t deny that it wasn’t at least somewhat fuelled by her own curiosity about the woman in the field. She intrigues her. She has since the beginning, and Maria has had a pretty good handle on not letting it get the better of her until now. Though, she still hadn’t planned on the case taking quite this turn.
Natasha sinks into the sofa with a grunt, more than a foot from Maria for the first time since they’d gotten outside and she pretends she doesn’t feel colder for it. The cushions are a little dusty but she can’t really find the focus to care as she presses a hand to her opposite arm. It’s just a graze, and it stopped bleeding quite so much before they even got into the streets, but it burns and stings and pulses all at once and, god, she forgot how much she hates being on the other side of a gun. She watches Maria make a round of the windows, gun in hand as she closes each blind and curtain, and she wonders vaguely if Fury would make her replace the couch if she did get blood on it. She’s sure drycleaning would work.
“All clear,” Maria announces at last. She has a matching split in her eyebrow, blood crusted over her cheekbone and the pink of a bruise that will settle in tomorrow. “Twelve hours to kill until Evac can get here.”
She stands in front of the other side of the sofa, not looking like she’s about to sit down any time soon. Poor Maria, can’t even relax when the job is done. It tugs at Natasha’s lips, her smirk barely covered as she lets her tone dip into something almost sultry. “However will we pass the time?”
Maria doesn’t so much as flinch. “There might not be a medical to go to but that doesn’t mean I’m letting you skip it.”
Natasha can’t pretend she isn’t a little disappointed, but it’s not like she’d expected any different. It’s all reprimanding looks and blank stares and it always has been. Maria Hill doesn’t sputter. She’s never even seen her blush. “What does that mean?”
“Covering a wound with your hand doesn’t make it disappear.” She nods towards the streaks of blood, smudged and dried between Natasha’s fingers from when it was fresh. “There’s a kit in the bathroom, come on.”
She wants to argue. The Black Widow doesn’t take orders. But Natasha Romanoff has a soft spot that her younger self would definitely sneer at, and instead, she stands up with little more than a huff. She thinks it might be worth it after all when it earns her a subdued chuckle from the bathroom doorway.
The safe house isn’t exactly the idea of luxury, but SHIELD locations are supposed to blend in with the local structure and this is the only one even remotely within walking distance for their current, appropriately remote, location. So, a single bed, open plan apartment on the edge of the nearest city it is – and a bathroom that certainly isn’t made for two.
Maria is standing in front of the mirror by the time Natasha catches up with her, leant over the sink to prod at her eyebrow. She watches her make a face, moving her eyebrows around to assess the damage, and it’s such a wildly different image to her usually stoic persona that Natasha almost laughs. It catches as some choked sound in her throat and Maria turns to her, one eyebrow still pinned up in question.
“Nothing,” she says, thumping her chest in an entirely unconvincing effort, a smirk still lingering.
Maria’s eyes narrow playfully before she returns to her task. She doesn’t smile but Natasha has come to expect as much. She has other ways to show her favouritism. Ways that Natasha cherishes in secret and flaunts in public.
Luckily, she can see her own arm without a mirror, so she sits herself on the toilet seat, her knees brushing Maria’s calf in the limited space.
“Kit’s under here,” Maria supplies, kicking the cabinet under the sink lightly.
She steps to the side to allow Natasha access but her shoulder bushes against her thigh as she crouches down anyway and Natasha curses herself for the way her pulse races like some sort of touch starved teenager. She supposes she never really did get to be one. Maybe it’s catching up to her late.
Either way. It’s embarrassing.
She shuffles out of the way so that Maria can knee the cabinet shut again, reclaiming her seat on the toilet so she can open the bag on her lap. She rifles through it, taking a mini inventory.
“Stitches?” she asks simply, hand hovering over the little sewing kit.
Maria leans a little closer to the mirror, setting her weight on her arms and Natasha strains to keep her eyes on her lap instead of the flex of her triceps. When did she even take her suit off? It’s stripped down to her waist, leaving her in a grey tank underneath and more skin on show than Natasha can frankly keep up with.
She’s startled out of her haze by Maria’s eventual reply. “Don’t think so.”
“Shit punch?” She puts her smirk into her voice, rummaging through the bag as nonchalantly as possible.
Maris hums, low and sweet. “Awful form.”
And of course she’d find time to critique an enemy's technique in the moment. She’d probably write them a detailed report if they weren’t sagged against some wall right now. “They wouldn’t last two seconds in your fleet.”
It’s as close as they’ll come to banter whilst still technically in the field. As close as they’ll come to banter in general, really, save for the few precious moments when Maria’s mask has slipped enough to allow her a smile and a chuckle in the privacy of her office. Precious moments that Natasha definitely doesn’t replay a hundred times over in the safety of her own quarters.
She’s sure there’s a quirk in Maria’s lips when she holds a hand out, fingertips smudged with dried brown and fresh red. She must have reopened it. She doesn’t actually need to say anything for Natasha to know what she needs, their communication as effective silent as it has been spoken for years now. Natasha still holds her selection of items just out of reach.
She’s smirking when Maria finally tears her eyes from the mirror in curiosity, though her head remains still. It’s halfway to a glare, just out of the corner of her eye Natasha doesn’t want to think about the way that look flips in her stomach.
“What’s the magic word?”
Maria rolls her eyes at that, and this time there’s no doubt about the begrudging smile at her lips. She knows she can’t argue after how many times she’s reminded Natasha about her own manners and she takes a rueful breath.
“May I have some alcohol wipes, please?”
Natasha grins, cat-like and far more proud of herself than she should be. “You may.”
Her smile still lingers as Maria takes the wipes and steristrips from Natasha’s hand and she pretends that the brush of her fingers against her palm doesn’t send sparks along her arm. It leaves a little smudge of red and Natasha stares at it for longer than is probably healthy.
There’s no need for stitches on her own arm, so she gets to disinfecting herself too in a silence somewhere comfortable-adjacent. She listens to the rhythm of Maria’s breathing, catches the little hiss of it when she must press the wipe to her skin, the sting of it a familiar winter-hot, and her knee presses into Maria’s calf again without thinking about it. She half expects Maria to move away, but maybe they’re close enough that the movement can be mistaken for an accident, only a small margin between random little bumps and a constant pressure. She could almost tell herself that Maria leans into it. She could tell herself that Maria finds as much comfort in Natasha as she does in her.
But Natasha isn’t in the habit of lying to herself so boldly.
She ignores every other lie she’s told herself about the nature of her feelings until now.
The graze is covered with gauze for the safety of the bedsheets if nothing else. Typically, Natasha would prefer to let it breathe and scab over the good ol’ traditional way, but something tells her that Maria would rather her cover it on this occasion. And that damn soft spot…
She’s tying the bandage off with her teeth when she feels Maria’s gaze on her, meeting her eyes with the end of it still caught between them. It makes Maria’s eyes crinkle in that barely-there way that Natasha has come to know better than her own face and she drops it like a dog with a bone.
“I’ll guess you’re not going to shower then,” Maria muses, leaning back against the sink with those same awfully distracting arms.
“No.” And the weight of her head is suddenly front and centre in her mind, never quite aware of her exhaustion until it’s pointed out to her. Until she’s allowed it, she thinks, a little darkly. Old habits die hard. “Go ahead.”
“Thanks,” she says, a hint of Natasha’s snark in her expression before she nods to the door and it’s gone so fast Natasha could think she’d imagined it. “I’ll catch you up.”
The shower is already running as the door latches closed and Natasha pauses with her hands still pressed against the smooth painted wood, trying not to think too hard about what is happening on the other side. The house has one bedroom and they haven’t stopped to discuss sleeping arrangements. ‘I’ll catch you up,’ means that Maria is expecting them to room together, right?
Honestly, Natasha has never really gotten around to asking about Maria’s preferred sleeping habits. It’s not exactly something that seems to be a choice topic in their line of work – and it’s not like Natasha would ever need to know for more personal reasons. They’re not like that. No matter how many hours she’s lain awake thinking about it.
She strips her own suit down to her hips as she walks over to the bedroom. It’s a twin bed, by the look of it. Maybe a small double. Physically, there is enough space for the both of them, but she isn’t sure how comfortable Maria will be with being that close. Maybe she should wait so she can offer to sleep on the floor. She’s slept in worse places.
But the wind howls at the window, and as her body finally starts to unwind, the cold sets back in. She doesn’t have any spare clothes with her and the wardrobes here are bare, clearly never used enough for someone to remember to put anything in them. Some more frequented safe houses even have tea and coffee, and Natasha takes back every time she’s had an ill thought about the powdered creamer to accompany it. She’s not going to sleep in her suit, and she’s not going to sleep on the floor in her underwear. Maria will have to deal with it.
She leaves her suit in a heap by the foot of the bed, telling herself it’ll be easier to grab it in the morning if it’s on the way. It’s entirely an excuse, she just doesn’t want to admit to herself that she’s too lazy to fold it. It’s torn to pieces around the arm anyway, it’s not like the repair people will complain about another crease in the body – and that’s if they don’t just make her a new one. They love adding improvements when the field notes come in.
Her shoulders ache, her legs unsteady as she makes her way to the side of the bed furthest from the door – an instinct too deep set to even think about these days – and she takes her time stretching them out for a moment. One to twenty, counting her breaths in and out for each leg, and then she sits down on the edge of the mattress and does the same for her shoulders. It helps a little, the stiffness dissipating enough that she just feels tired.
Luckily, the bed is soft and the duvet is warm, and she burrows under it to chase away the chill of the air this far out from the main city, pressed right up against the edge to leave as much space as possible.
The house is suddenly silent as the water turns off in the next room over, the shuffle of Maria moving around just about audible if she strains, and the sudden click of the door hurts her ears as it breaks the silence. Maria appears in the doorway in boxer shorts and the same tank top from earlier, a little damp around the neck where her hair is still drying.
She spots the pile of suit on the floor and shoots Natasha a look that is far too warm to really be called annoyance before she walks over to pick it up. The whole sight in front of her feels so entirely domestic, watching Maria fold up her clothes and lay them gently over the footboard as she huddles under the covers, that Natasha has to blink herself into the moment and remind herself that they’re on a mission. The lights flick off and Natasha lets the thought fizzle into the dark.
Maria doesn’t seem to hesitate before climbing into the other side of the bed, and Natasha envies the forward planning to be wearing underclothes. Though, Maria gets cold easily, and she suspects that she’s probably wishing she’d brought winter thermals for herself instead.
Maria’s thigh brushes up against hers, taking up the space that has been given to her, and Natasha half expects her to shift away again, to recoil like she’s burned. When she doesn’t, Natasha relaxes a little more for reasons she refuses to inspect too closely. She doesn’t want to make her uncomfortable, that’s all.
She’s never been able to sleep on her back. She’s fallen asleep in some strange places, out of necessity or exhaustion, but her back always leaves her feeling oddly exposed. She doesn’t really want to move right now, though, so she stares at the ceiling for a moment, trying to make out shapes in the pitch dark of the night here. It reminds her slightly of her childhood, of cold nights and darkness thick like molasses. They were never scared of the dark, but they still snuck into each other’s beds when they learnt how to escape their handcuffs for the warmth of another living person to chase off the bite of the Russian winters. So, she wants to turn to her side, curl up small like she always has, but if she moves then Maria’s thigh won’t be pressed up warm against hers, a reminder that this is real. She pulls a face at the thought, thankful that Maria can’t see her in the dark, and shifts if only to prove to herself that she isn’t that pathetic.
She isn’t sure whether the sound caught in her throat is one of annoyance or something much, much less welcome when her knees tuck up and her shins end up pressed against the length of Maria’s hip, from her waist all the way down to her thigh. This is so much worse for any sleep she was planning on actually getting before they’re picked up.
Again, she expects Maria to move away and when, again, she doesn’t, Natasha sinks a little further into the mattress, her heartbeat ticking up an embarrassing degree. She’s laying on her bad arm now, the heat of it throbbing against the mattress, but from this angle she can see that Maria is flat on her back, her posture as picture perfect in bed as it is in the conference room, and if she thinks about it, she can feel the ghost of her elbow just next to her knee, her arms folded across her stomach. Of course Maria sleeps like a corpse. She can’t help the smile that creeps its way onto her face at the thought.
She can just about make out her profile in the dark, tucking her arm up under her pillow and tracing the line of Maria’s nose as she settles her head back into it. At least the view is nice, she thinks sarcastically to herself, Maria’s skin cool and burning all at once against hers. Her breathing is deep and even and she syncs hers with the rhythm of it. Slow enough anyone might think she was asleep, but somehow Natasha thinks she knows she’s awake. She wonders if she can feel her eyes on her but she can’t bring herself to close them yet.
Her suspicions are proved correct when Maria shivers next to her, obviously repressed but unavoidable when so much of them is already touching.
“Cold?” Natasha asks before she can stop herself, her voice scratchy in the delicate quiet. Maria hums her agreement, her eyes still closed. “Clint used to stick his hands down my collar when they were cold.”
She doesn’t know why she says it – doesn’t really know why she says a lot of things to Maria. She just seems to drag things out of her, some invisible fishing hook dredging up things she thought she’d kept down deep for herself alone. She should be worried, should hate her for the way she’d tell her anything she asked and the advantage that gives her, but she’s more worried by the fact that she doesn’t seem to mind at all. She’s hesitant to say that she likes it, but maybe she lies to herself more than she realises.
“That doesn’t surprise me,” comes Maria’s reply, and her voice rough around the edges too, thick and syrup sweet as she nudges her gently with her thigh. “You’re very warm.”
It’s spoken so casually that Natasha thinks she must have misheard. She thought this would be something they never mention. Just a part of the mission. That one time she had to share a bed with the Black Widow playing teddy bear next to her all night. But it’s there now, spoken into existence, as if Natasha could have hidden from it come the morning had it not been.
She tries to steady a heart before Maria manages to hear it somehow but it only seems to flutter harder in her chest. Some small voice dares to ask if Maria feels everything as keenly as herself, if she is also aware of every inch between them and every word on her lips. She curses herself for the hope that settles warm beneath her ribs.
She’s not really sure how to respond, but if she’s honest with herself for once, she doesn’t really want this conversation to end either, even as sleep drags at the edges of her consciousness.
“Anya used to say that.”
A beat.
“Anya?”
And she knew she shouldn’t have said it the moment it came out of her mouth. She’s wondering what ever happened to actually thinking about what she’s going to say first when Maria turns her head, searching for her in the darkness. She isn’t sure how much of her she can actually see in this light, the shine of Maria’s eyes just barely lit, but she smooths out the crease between her own eyebrows nonetheless.
“We, um.” She swallows, smoothing her hand over the duvet in the space between them. This isn’t something she’s even discussed with Clint at length, and she forces herself to sit with the awkward silence whilst she thinks her words through.
This is a part of her she rarely lets herself think about, a bittersweet part of a childhood she remembers too vividly and barely at all. She wants to dismiss it, take back the name and lie that it was Clint who used to climb into her bed in the night and huddle close in case it was the last chance they had, but she finds she doesn’t want to lie. Not to Maria.
She wants Maria to know the truest version of herself, even when she doesn’t know what that means herself, and it’s terrifying. Everything in her tells her that it’s stupid, that it’s the worst possible decision she could make.
She always has been one for risks.
“She was one of the other girls,” she settles on at last, and she realises that Maria is still listening, patient as ever as she waited for her response. She doesn’t need to explain further before Maria hums her acknowledgement. There’s no expectation in it, nothing that says tell me more, and somehow, Natasha finds that more convincing than any words she could have used.
She laughs, just a soft breath through her nose but still loud in the room. “She could dislocate her thumbs and she learned how to get out of handcuffs before the rest of us. She’d sneak over to my bunk when it was cold and use me like a space heater.” Her voice almost wavers, the memories sharp and hazy all together, stinging at the corners of her eyes.
“I never thought to do that with my squad,” Maria quips, brushing over the emotion clear in Natasha’s voice, and she couldn’t be more thankful.
“It works,” Natasha replies, and she really doesn’t know what she’s thinking now. She can hear her pulse in her ears, only half convinced that Maria isn’t able to hear it herself.
She’s certain Maria is going to hear the question in her voice, find her pleading between the lines. She’s certain this is the last mission she’s ever going to have with her and she’s figuring out how she’s going to explain her foul mood to Clint without giving away the things she doesn’t even tell herself when Maria’s response comes softly in the dark.
“Yeah?”
And she knows that tone, knows the careful measure of playful hope that cushions your expectations. A layer of plausible denial.
It’s Natasha’s term to hum her response, with all of the nonchalance she can muster. Maria shivers again and she resists the urge to reach out to her. “You’ve really never done it before?”
Maria shakes her head and Natasha hears it more than she sees it. “We were mostly stationed in warm climates.” She laughs softly, an edge to it that Natasha feels more keenly than she’d like too, “And it’s not like people really wanted to once I’d joined SHIELD.”
I want to, Natasha thinks, the words lodged in her throat. Instead, she tucks her arm back under their duvet and opens up the space between them.
Maria stares at her for a moment longer before she shifts, turning a little further towards her, and it’s like she’s trying to get a better look at her in the dark, like she’s trying to get a read on the offer. The silence stretches out until Natasha feels too exposed to keep her arm there any longer, until she’s drawn open and spread out across the space between them so Maria can see into every part of her even without lights.
Her arm twitches with indecision, about to pull back, when Maria finally finds her words. “Isn’t that your bad arm?” She nods just slightly to where it’s tucked up under her pillow.
It catches Natasha off guard and she stalls for a moment, the duvet held up for a split second before she lets it drop. She shrugs. It drags across the sheets and she’s probably bleeding again. “It’s alright. Doesn’t hurt as much now.”
Maria’s expression shifts into something far too soft for Natasha’s sake and she turns fully onto her side, her knees brushing up against her’s as she mirrors her. “It’ll hurt less if you turn over.”
She’s right. But that also means that Natasha won’t be able to look at her anymore. She blinks once in consideration but she already knows that she isn’t going to fight it. It would mean putting her back to the door and yet, somehow, she finds she doesn’t find the anxiety in it. She’s not really sure what to do with the trust she has for her, entirely unused to the way it sits in her chest. She turns over if only to stop Maria from seeing it all in her eyes.
And, yeah, it does hurt less. It’s cooler on the wound, and she can’t feel the way it throbs without the pressure of her whole body on it, but now she only has sound to go by to tell what Maria is thinking. She can hear her gentle huff of amusement before she can even admit to feeling better and she fights the urge to curl in on herself until she could disappear into the duvet completely.
There’s another breath, this time more strained as Maria fights another shiver, and Natasha wonders if she’d really rather suffer than have her even look at her. She’s given barely a second to wallow in her own self depreciation before Maria’s voice is soft and rumbly in the air again.
“Is that offer still standing?” There’s a careful measure of playfulness in it, as if Natasha could ever dream of saying no to her.
“Of course,” she replies, and she hopes that it’s the right amount of unbothered.
She holds herself perfectly still as she feels Maria shift behind her, and then Maria’s arm is sliding over her waist and she can practically feel the hesitance in the movement. She shuffles backwards slightly, hoping that maybe it will soothe her any, and she feels Maria settle a little further into the mattress with a contented breath, just barely there. It brushes over the skin of her neck and Natasha ignores the way it twists in her stomach, ignores the flutter in her heart and the burning in her lungs at the sound of it.
Natasha’s skin is warm against her own and Maria wonders if she’ll ever recover now that she knows how this feels, now that she doesn’t have to wonder what it’s like to hold her like normal people do. It’s going to ruin her, come morning, to have to pretend that this was simply something platonic and fleeting. She should never have planned this mission in the first place.
Natasha’s breaths are deep and steady, each one moving Maria’s arm just slightly where it rests on her waist and she fights the urge to hold her tighter, to pull her against her like she might simply disappear otherwise. Instead, she tucks her face against the nape of her neck, presses her forehead against her skin and soaks up the warmth of her. She thinks she must have gone insane, to allow herself this, to risk Natasha picking up on the meaning between every interaction. She wonders if somehow Natasha can tell what she’s thinking now that they’re pressed together like this, heart to heart, and it’s absurd, she knows, but she doesn’t often grant herself absurdity. Maybe this is what Natasha does to her.
If her heart keeps racing like it is, then Natasha probably will be able to tell what she’s thinking.
“You’re right,” she says instead, even though she’s sure Natasha is probably half asleep. She’s tired too, weighingly so, but she just can’t bring herself to let go of this yet.
“Hm?” Natasha sounds sleepy, soft and distracted. She wonders what she thinks about to fall asleep.
“This is much warmer.”
“Speak for yourself,” she murmurs back, and maybe her tone would carry more annoyance if it weren’t so muffled. “Your hands are freezing.”
“Right. Sorry.”
She moves to pull away, and Natasha covers her hand with her own before she can even think to stop herself, stilling it against the bottom of her ribs. “It’s fine. Don’t want you getting hypothermia.”
Maria laughs softly and Natasha doesn’t think she’ll ever get over the feeling of it. “I don’t think it’s cold enough for that.”
“It’s cold enough that they’ll ache tomorrow,” she corrects gently.
Her hand twitches in hers, the slightest betrayal of her emotions. To be seen for her weakness and have them used for comfort is a strange sense of reversal. “I’m used to it. They’re not as bad anymore.”
Natasha holds on a little tighter for a split moment and such a brief movement has never felt like it’s exposing so much. “It’s my job to notice things, Maria. Some might say I’m the best at it, even.”
It makes Maria laugh again, some feat that Natasha has always had a knack for. She wonders just how much Natasha has noticed about her, and she thinks she should be more worried that she can’t tell whether it scares her or not. Maybe it’s about time someone really saw her. About time she let someone.
“That’s a bold statement,” she says instead.
“You’re saying you’re better?” Natasha knows Maria can hear her smirk, even if she can’t see it.
She’s not sure why Maria is indulging her so far, or how she hasn’t simply fallen asleep in the meantime. She knows that Maria is just as tired as herself, if not more so, if the way her eyelids drooped in the bathroom mirror was anything to go by.
“Only one of us is Assistant Director,” she replies, without hesitation, and Natasha is sure there’s a matching smile on Maria’s face.
“Give it a few months.”
Natasha thinks that she could listen to Maria’s sleepy laugh forever. She thinks she’d like to hear it every day for the rest of her life and then some, and some awful, naive part of her thinks that maybe she has a chance, that maybe this, right now, means something.
If she was someone braver, someone who had grown up where they had taught her how to love instead of fight, maybe she’d bring her hand up and kiss it. Maybe she’d turn over to face her and lay heart bare instead of hiding herself in the small space between them. Maybe, she thinks. But she isn’t.
She hears Maria yawn behind her and curls miraculously further in on herself at the sweet sound of it. Come morning, this will just be another mission, something that they never speak about again. She curses herself for the hope that has made its home in her chest, for the way that it says maybe Maria feels like this too.
The signs are there, aren’t they? In the lilt of her voice, the hesitancy of her hands. Maybe if she weren’t such a coward. Maybe if they were anyone else. She’ll find it in herself eventually, take herself apart piece by broken piece until she does. It might take her years, but she will. Maria makes her want to. For now, she lets the darkness of the room press everything into something small enough for a coward to swallow.
Maria listens to her breathing slow and stills her hand where it itches to trace patterns into her skin. There are words bubbling up, caught behind her teeth, that she wishes she could release. Let them hang in the dark and fade away with the morning. She presses them flat to the roof of her mouth, closes her eyes against the way they try to spill out instead.
Under any other circumstances. Under any other sky. But they are who they are, and she’ll let Natasha choose this the way she has let Natasha choose everything for herself. She’ll be whatever she needs her to be, and right now, with her hand weaved in hers, she’ll simply be here.
One day, they will. They’ll hold each other tighter and they’ll say all of the words they’ve hidden between the lines their entire lives. They’ll do the things they’ve never dared to wish they could have and they’ll pretend they’re just like everyone else. One day will come.
For now, they’ll sleep in their own little fantasies where everything already is and has and will, and in the morning they’ll wash out the bitter-sweetness of it together in the kitchen with awful tea and worse coffee – but they will be together.