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The amount of times Clint has stumbled into their farm barely conscious and bleeding from more places than not, wasn’t a lot. Clint despises hospitals more than your average person, but he also doesn’t want to scare or worry his kids and wife like that (what Clint forgets is that Fury calls and informs Laura every time he gets hospitalized, which leads to the same worry except that they know he’s in good hands at the SHIELD infirmary). He only flees to the farm and his family if everything has gone to hell and back, and that is exactly what has happened in this case.
-
The empty dirt road ahead of Clint is ever so familiar. He’s driven it at least six dozen times, at all times of the day, in snow storms, heat waves, rain you name it. He’s lived on the farm his whole life, except for the years he and Barney were at the orphanage and ran away to the circus, and the years he’s spent in his assigned room at SHIELD headquarters around the globe. This old dirt road reminds him of his childhood, reminds him of his older brother and himself biking on it, scraping his knees on it when he crashed, it reminds him of his clothes getting all dusty as the dirt swirled around in the air.
And if there’s one thing Clint knows about this road is that it leads to one special place: Home.
And for the past 48 hours that’s all he’s wanted to do. Just to say screw it all, screw SHIELD, screw the mission, screw his health, as long as he could get home to the warm embrace of Laura’s arms and have his kids cling around his legs like they always did when he came home after being away for god knows how long. This time, the trip home wasn’t planned though, Clint is willing to admit that this time it’s just him running away from everything without looking back. It’s an old instinct he’s had ever since he was a scrawny little kid, running away and hiding from the world whenever he’s hurt. Back in the days, when Father Barton took his anger out him and the rest of their small family, he used to run as far away from the farm as he could, and crawl up in the biggest tree he could find, all the way up to the top where the branches got too thin for anyone to reach him. No one could hurt him, or even lay a finger on him there. This time he’s running back to his home instead of away from it, because there’s no threat there anymore, only people who care about him.
He slows down just a bit to let a dear pass over the road in front of him, and slowly begins recognising the trees, the driveways to other people’s farms. In less than 10 minutes he’ll be home. He only has to hold on to himself for 10 minutes more.Clint squeezes his eyes shut tight for a few seconds before reopening them. Nausea swept through him and for a second he thought of pulling over and hurling his already empty stomach up. The last time Clint got any sleep was 56 hours ago and that was only a petty two hours before he woke up drenched in cold sweat with chills running down his spine, the image of icy blue printed on his retinas. Then he’d got sent into this shitshow of a mission which requires maximum effort.
Didn’t it just suit him perfect to only get 2 hours of sleep before a mind controlling nightmare of icy blue woke him up, and then going on a mission for 48 hours without stopping. Sure, he’s tried worse with the whole Asgardian affaire, but that didn’t make this situation any easier. The road arches a tiny bit, and their driveway becomes visible a few hundred meters ahead of him.
Barney was just a scrawny 14 year old kid at that time, turning 15 in a couple of months. Harold, also known as dad, had decided that now was the time for his son to learn to drive just so he knew the basics before he began to really get his license. With Clint strapped into the backseat of their car, Harold riding shotgun, and Barns behind the wheel, they went out for his third time. Nine year old Clint would’ve been squealing with excitement by now, if his dad hadn’t told him to be quiet. Clint used to look up to his brother more than anyone else, he’d do anything for him back then, and practically saw him as some kind of god, like all kids do with their older siblings. Barney is driving nice and careful out of the driveway, and has briefly paused just before the mainroad to make sure there aren’t any other cars.
“Be careful in the swing, it’s tricky,” his dad reminds him, and Barn answers with a single nod, his lips pressed tight together in a straight firm line as he concentrates to remember how exactly one drives.
Even though Clint’s vision is currently slightly blurry and darkened at the edges, he can still clearly see their mailbox by the road with the name “BARTON” written over it in black block letters. A car passes by him, but the driver doesn’t turn the high beam off and momentarily blinds Clint in a sea of white, his headache spiking again like someone is stabbing in his brain with a needle. This time Clint is certain that he's gonna hurl, but he pushes it down and forces himself to at least get home first. He pushes down on the speeder and swings into their driveway.
“Harold,” Edith says in her shrill voice on the verge of crying “Harold, you need to slow down,” she almost begs, but her husband isn’t hearing any of it. He straight up ignores her, like many time before. He reeks of beer, his shirt stained with the substance from when he fell over earlier because he couldn’t walk straight. Edith knows this is insanely dangerous, and she knows that she should be the one driving, but the bruises on her arms and face are just now beginning to fade and the thought of getting more just seems unbearable.
“Darling, please, you have to slow down!” she pleads, putting a hand on his shoulder, but Harold immediately shrugs it off.
“Shut up, woman,” he growls as he speeds up even more. Edith removes her eyes from him and looks out the windshields, clinging her hand tightly to the arm rest. Up ahead she notices their driveway, but Harold doesn’t slow down. He doesn’t even look if there’s any other cars.
“HAROLD!” she screams, but it’s too late, it’s all too late, and her husband rips the wheel around to turn into their driveway, but the dirt road is slippery and uneven, the rain splashing on their windshield, splashing up from the wheels, and she screams her lungs out as the car flips over. Black.
His head hurts. That’s all Clint registers in the instant he regains consciousness, that’s all his mind is filled with. His head fucking hurts and his ears are ringing and his back and neck is sore and and and-
Fuck.
Clint opens his eyes wondering why the hell they were closed in the first place-
“What the.. hell?” is all Clint manages before his stomach doubles over and he falls to his hands and knees, just before he pukes up his already empty stomach. Thirty seconds later it’s all over, and he spits into the pool of his stomach contents, hoping that it would remove the acidic taste in his mouth. It didn’t help anything.
Slowly, carefully he stumbles to his feet, running a hand through his messy hair which is filled with sticky blood, some of it already dried clinging his hairs together and some of it fresh, still leaking from the bottom of his scalp. Too much.
He bites his bottom lip as he looks at the mess he made, immediately regretting his decision as a sharp pain shoot through him. The bittersweet mix of blood and puke in his mouth makes him wanna throw up again, but Clint bites his teeth together and is well god damn determined to at least get home before he collapses.
“Come on, Chickenbutt! The one who gets last to the mailbox has to do the dishes tonight!” Barney yells over his shoulder as he bikes his very fastest out of their driveway. Upon hearing the challenge, Clint immediately drops his helmet he was mid strapping on and jumps on his bike to get to his brother.
“That’s unfair!” he yells, but Barney just laughs at him. Dust swirls up in the air around them, as the two brothers fights their best to get in first place, but Barney is already several feet ahead of him.
“Hah, chickenshit! I win!” he yells as he passes the mailbox and turns his head around to stick his tongue out at Clint who looking back at him with utter horror painted all over his face.
“Barney!” Clint yells but it’s too late. It’s all too late.
A hospital room had never been more quiet.
-
For the past 30 minutes, Laura has without luck tried to find Lila’s plushie, because her daughter straight up refuses to go to sleep without it. She is tired, and just wants to sit down for a minute or two, but before that even becomes a possibility, she’ll have to tuck in her kids. Sometimes she wishes that her husband was around more, it would make the life around here much easier for all of them. She'd looked everywhere according to herself: Under Lila’s bed, in the kitchen where her daughter sometimes drags Mr. Wolfie along for breakfast, the closet in Lila’s room, the laundry basket where it could’ve ended up by mistake. Eventually, Lila finds it herself in the space between the wall and her bed, where it had fallen down during the previous night.
“Goodnight, darling,” Laura says, once Lila is tucked in, and places a sweet kiss on her daughter's forehead. She can’t help but laugh when Lila wiggles in her bed, still full over energy like someone had given her an energy drink mixed with sugar and coffee. (Laura suspects that she get all that energy from her Dad)
“Mom?” Lila asks as she tugs Wolfie in even tighter. “Will you read that Penny and Dime book? Please?” she asks, blinking with her brown eyes, well knowing that, that look will get her far in this world.
“Tomorrow sweetheart,” Laura promises, and Lila frowns
“When will Dad read it?” she asks, and damn if that just wasn’t what Laura needed right now. Clint had been shipped around the world on missions for SHIELD for the past 5 weeks now. She missed him too.
“Soon, I’ll get him to call whenever he can okay?” she says, trying to cover up the truth that she had no idea when his next return would be. Lila simply nods “Goodnight,” Laura says as she gets up from the bedside, but is stopped by Lila’s hand gripping her shirt
“You have to say goodnight to Mr. Wolfie too!” she says with a slight grin, and Laura bends down to kiss the grey wolf that’s currently wrapped in Lila’s arm, nearly getting choked by how hard she hugging him.
“And goodnight to you too, Mr. Wolfie,” She says, and pats the plushie on the head before leaving the room with the door cracked open, letting the light from the hall shine into the room, letting it stay on through the night just in case someone wakes up.
Cooper is far too busy reading the third book of the series he’s been marathoning for the past week to notice Laura coming into his room. His eyes are moving fast over the pages, reading the lines like it’s a race he has to finish. His eyes has been glued to the pages all evening.
“One last chapter,” Laura reminds, and he looks up from his book, nodding shortly before returning to the pages. She’s just stepped outside his room when she hears a creaking - a creaking that she is ever so familiar with, a creaking she hears almost every day in the afternoon, and a creaking she hasn’t expected before at least next week.
She hurries down the stairs, unlocks the door and rips it open, only to find her husband clinging to the railing on the three stepped stairs leading up to their front porch. Blood stains the right side of his head from his hairline all the way down to his uniform, soaking the black fabric into a deep red color. His neck on the left side is equally colored in brown-ish coagulated blood.
“Oh my god,” Laura bursts out as she runs to Clint’s side, her hands hovering an inch over his body, not sure where she can grab to help him without hurting him or worsening his condition.
“I know I should’ve called ahead, sorry,” Clint grunts loudly out through gritted teeth. Knowing Clint, him showing any kind of pain is out of character, and Laura instantly knows how bad it is. Or so she thinks.
“Shut it, Clint,” she snaps, and reaches her right hand out to him. ”Take my hand, I’ve got you,” Laura says, but Clint has already clung his hand to hers like a lifeline. She grabs his hand as she quickly scoops under his armpit, wrapping her arm around his waist to steady him, and puts his arm over her shoulder to hold him up. Maybe Laura is skinny and beautiful, but she’s made of muscles and could probably bench press her own weight is she wanted to. Slowly she guides him into the house, kicking the door shut behind them and puts him onto the couch gently.
Exhausted, Clint lays down and closes his eyes for the first time in 48 hours, but he immediately regrets it when pictures of the mission SHIELD still believes he’s on flashes before his closed eyelids. Instead he looks up at his beautiful wife and prays to anyone that will listen that Laura will stay by his side no matter what happens. He knows they’re in for one of the biggest challenges in their lives, which is saying a lot, and without her he knows he won’t make it through this. To hell with losing his job over this.
Clint can see her lips moving but what she says is a mystery.
She talks to him again, but there is nothing but numb silence surrounding him.