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Nick doesn't tell Phil where they're driving to, and he tries not to guess. Eventually, they pull into a cemetery.
He wouldn’t have guessed that.
"You know,” Nick says as he slowly drives down the winding road that cuts through the neatly trimmed grass and gravestones, “we keep an eye on every grave where we’re supposed to have someone buried. In case anyone comes snooping.”
Nick parks the car and nods towards the man curled into a ball in front of a headstone a few rows over.
He doesn't know what he's done to deserve this, and if his throat hadn’t closed off in an attempt to stem the dry, heaving sobs he feels coming, he would have told Nick exactly that.
“He visits every year,” Nick tells him, “a week and a day after the anniversary of New York."
Phil clears his throat. He watches Clint chew his thumbnail.
"First year I thought, ‘Hey, you know, he was probably busy on assignment last week.’ Right? But every year since, it’s been the same day. Same tulips.”
Every year for five years. He really expected Clint to have moved on.
For a moment, he pictures himself getting out of the car and going to Clint; pictures himself wrapping him in his arms. He can’t even bring himself to put his hand on the car door handle. Instead, all he can do is ask, in the plainest interrogation-training voice he has in his back pocket just for moments like this, "Is there something you’re wanting to ask, sir?"
"Weren't tulips your mother's favorite flower?"
"I'm very certain you've already confirmed that they were."
Nick looks at him for a long moment. Then he shifts the car into gear and pulls away.
Phil chews the inside of his cheek nearly bloody on the ride back to base.
Of course, Phil knows why Clint goes to his fake grave exactly eight days after the anniversary of New York every year.
And he knows why tulips and he knows why Clint curls up like that in front of his gravestone and now it's all he can think about as he lays awake in bed.
It’s the one night a year he allows himself to wallow.
He drinks himself to sleep with a bottle of scotch identical to the one he bought himself years ago, in anticipation of what didn’t happen on May 12, 2012.
Phil is not supposed to be in HQ this afternoon. He’s supposed to be on a jet to Santiago, but there had been a fuel gauge problem. Phil is supposed to be halfway across the globe.
He knows Nick is livid about it; knows how hard he tasks his people to make sure they avoid situations like this.
For Phil’s part, it’s risky and stupid and more than a little masochistic. He knows all of this. He still can't help himself.
Black Widow is doing a good job interrogating her prisoner, Phil thinks. Or rather, he assumes. He hasn't had the mics on, because if he hears her partner's voice, he's not sure he'll be able to stay on this side of the two-way mirror.
Hawkeye's back ripples as he slams his palms on the table and makes some sort of threat that the prisoner better respect Black Widow and answer her questions. Or, he says something like that, at least; that's how it usually goes.
His arms are thick and tan and Phil knew this was a stupid idea, but he couldn't help himself.
Phil turns on his heel and leaves before he makes any more stupid decisions.
Clint is certain he’s seeing things.
His team is interrupting the middle of a firefight with Hydra at one of the few air bases still storing old SHIELD tech. On his perimeter check, Clint found a familiar-looking man holding off five Hydra agents with nothing but a pair of brass knuckles. He’s doing well, holding his own in the fight, but his attackers are slowly angling him towards where Clint’s perched on top of a shipping container. They’re trying to corner him to limit his options.
One of Hydra’s agents gets a strike past the man’s defenses and despite a few familiar defensive maneuvers to get away, blood blooms from where the knife slices through his white dress shirt sleeve.
Clint shakes himself; now isn’t the time to ask questions.
He downs one of the Hydra team with an arrow through his throat, cutting five down to four. Sliding his bow over his shoulder, he jumps from his perch, deftly landing behind the agent.
“I’ve got your six!” Clint shouts, and then he has his knives in his hands. He’s quick and keeps his focus straight ahead. He ignores how easily the two of them turn around each other—keeping the Hydra assailants on their toes. They start to push back, maneuvering the fight into a larger area, turning and pivoting around each other seamlessly.
“Duck,” the man behind him says, and muscle memory has Clint obeying orders from that voice before he even registers that’s exactly what he’s doing. One of the Hydra agents sails over Clint’s head.
It’s unnerving. It’s not right. It’s not possible.
“Tony, we could use a little air support over here!” Clint says into his comm, as one of his knives catches against one of the Hydra’s jackets and gets jerked out of his hand. Clint doesn’t hesitate—a backup from his boot is already in his hand.
“Aren’t you supposed to be on Team Air Support?” Tony’s voice cracks over the radio. “Be there in a minute.”
A handful of blasts come from around a corner, and the fight is over. The other man coughs against the dirt Tony’s blasters stir up, and Clint takes his chance.
“Who the fuck are you?” Clint demands, shoving the man—the agent, whoever the fuck—several steps back against the shipping container, pressing his knife alongside the other man’s neck.
He’s too shaken up to be ashamed that he has to press the knife harder to steady it in his hand, but if he doesn’t draw blood quite yet, no one but him will know.
There’s a thud as the brass knuckles hit the ground. The man holds up his hands and slowly lifts his eyes to face Clint. Clint presses closer, turning the tip of his knife to push right up against the man’s artery. His brilliant blue eyes are like smooth, crystalline water; eyes he knows better than any; eyes that haunt his dreams both blessedly beautiful and utterly terrifying; now, full of sorrow and regret that Clint can read easily as anything he’d ever seen.
“Agent Phil Coulson.” The man wearing Phil’s face swallows hard as he says it. “ID Number Sierra-Kilo-Juliett-08-Uniform-7342. You’re Agent Clint Barton, reporting to the Avengers as part of Initiative Alpha-8724. After we first met, you told Director Fury you wanted to join SHIELD because we’d have you eating better in the field than the CIA, but you told me six months after that it was really because when I asked why you used a bow, you could tell I was listening.”
Clint’s usually better at hiding his emotions. But he can’t stop his breath from coming faster, or his hand holding the knife from shaking.
“I’ve helped you move three times because you’re paranoid about SHIELD’s support staff seeing where you live. You got me an original Howling Commandos recruitment poster from 1944 for my thirty-fifth birthday. I got you the knife you’re holding from Kuwait for Christmas in 2002.”
Clint can’t breathe; he doesn’t know what to do, or say, or even think.
“I’ve been in love with you since our fifth mission together in Bangalore when you refused to let your fellow agents wait for an extraction team to save them from prison. And we were…” Phil’s voice is wavering; he presses his lips together in a flat line and doesn’t finish saying what Clint most especially doesn’t want to be reminded of.
Clint lowers the knife and sheaths it at his hip. Then he turns his back on Phil and walks away.
No more than four hours pass before Fury waltzes into the Avenger’s compound as if they owe him something, with Phil in tow.
Fury promises them explanations with a put-upon sigh as though they’re being childish.
Clint can't believe what he's hearing.
Tony and Steve are yelling and Bruce is covering his face with his hands and Nat's fuming silently in the corner. He can’t tell what he’s feeling and doesn’t know what he’s supposed to be saying or doing. He’s a terrifying mix of hopeful—a feeling he hasn’t felt in years—and elated and so, so, so furious, he can’t hold it in.
He can’t care what any of his teammates think: none of them lost what he lost when Phil Coulson died.
Clint finally cuts in when Tony pauses after his third, “And another thing!"
"I should have known."
Everyone, including Fury, turns and looks at him, but Phil is the last to look. His face is pinched and his shoulders slump.
"I couldn't, Clint. I—"
"I deserved to know."
"There wasn't any protocol—"
"Fuck protocol. I should have known. I never even told Nat.” That makes her jump and lift her eyebrows. “And you couldn't tell me this? You had to hide from me? And blame it on protocol?"
"We didn’t have any of the usual clearances in place."
Clint pulls the ring he keeps on him out of his front vest pocket and chucks it at Phil’s chest. It bounces off him and falls onto the conference table. "One week, Phil, and you're saying it would have been different?"
“Technically, eight—”
“Don’t give me fucking technicalities.”
"I know." Phil's voice shakes as he says it. The room is silent as Phil walks over to Clint and he squats down so that he's looking up at him. "You're right. I'm prepared to do whatever you need—whether it's listening or giving you space or whatever you need from me. But, please—"
"What did you expect me to do, Phil?"
"I...expected you would have moved on."
Clint lets out a harsh bark of a laugh. He feels tired; so exhausted he can barely breathe. "You honestly believed that?"
Phil clears his throat and tentatively reaches up to wrap his hand around the edge of Clint's jaw. Clint drops his eyes but places a hand on top of Phil's. He twines their fingers together and pulls Phil's hand back a little so he can kiss the pulse on Phil's wrist.
"I'll grovel for the rest of my life, Clint, if that's what it takes. Whatever it takes, I swear." Phil places his other hand on top of Clint's knee. That's when Clint notices Phil's wearing his engagement ring. He's not sure if he's going to start sobbing or just fall sideways out of his chair.
"Um. So, what exactly's going on?" Tony asks from the other side of the room and Phil starts laughing. It's infectious; Clint can't help but join him.
"Stand up. You're not groveling for anyone," Clint says, pulling Phil up and he stands with him. He holds Phil close to his chest and kisses him on his temple. Phil smiles at him; Clint glances around the room at the rest of the Avengers.
"We can tell 'em on our way to Vegas?" Clint asks Phil.
Phil grips Clint a little bit harder. "You're sure?"
"Well, we're not chancing another alien invasion," Clint quips.
Phil sighs, but his shoulders visibly relax; he gives Clint a small smile. “Yeah, we’ll explain on the way.”