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The storm was approaching.
John stood on the balcony, feeling the wind pick up, watching the sky turn black.
Like nature’s version of the Void.
Both moved slowly, menacing, swallowing everything in darkness.
Both let a person feel their wrath and power.
But the Void augmented the worst day of your life.
The storm let you drown in all of them.
When the rain came, he didn’t flinch.
It started slowly. But like any good spring storm, it picked up rapidly. Drizzle turned to steady turned to pouring. The rain drenched him. It consumed him.
And he let himself drown.
First, Olivia.
The smile. The warmth. The coolness of the ring on his finger. Their good luck kiss. The home decor she’d buy. The food she’d cook.
Then, his son.
The giggles. The brightly colored clothes he always wore. His first word (or semblance of one) sounding something like “Dada.” His cries that pained John, but the toddler antics that always made him laugh again.
Next, Lemar.
The back pats that grounded John. The certain comfort he had, that John needed in the midst of battle. Their shared football games. Lemar’s family dinner parties. The smell of their Georgia home.
Finally, Latvia.
It had been raining that day, too. Barely a drizzle. But the air was cold, the sky was sad.
The crack of Lemar’s neck.
The warmth leaving his body.
The crash of breaking glass.
Heart pounding in his ears, vision stained red, and he only saw the Flagsmasher.
The thump as he kicked the Flagsmasher to the ground, the muffled cries of protest. John’s inability to hear them.
The squelch from the first hit.
The squelch from the second one.
And the third, the fourth, the fifth.
The stares, horror, and judgement after.
Everything drifting by in a haze when he’d run from the scene.
All of it.
Crashing down upon him, just like the rain.
Somewhere, inside, Yelena watched the rain through a window.
She wasn’t directly exposed to it. Yet the overwhelming weight of water pouring down upon the world got to her.
She’d remember the storms that she’d grown up watching in Ohio. How she always hugged Alexei or Melina close, because she was scared of the dark. And how Natasha was always there to distract her.
It was all gone now, and it wasn’t coming back.
She sighed, laying back in her bed, staring at the ceiling.
Some days, she remembered the warmth from Natasha’s smiles. Or the jokes they’d crack, both as kids and as adults when they’d reunited.
Those days were wistful, but she could look back on good days. And feel some sort of happiness.
But today, that wasn’t the case.
The storm reawakened memories she thought she’d forgotten about.
CRACK!
The thunder boomed.
She remembered the sound of her baton hitting Clint Barton.
CRACK!
The thunder boomed again.
The sound of her baton hitting Clint again.
The blood.
The groaning.
The pleading.
All that she ignored.
Because she could only see Natasha.
Be reminded of what she’d lost.
If it hadn’t been for Clint’s whistle, she would’ve surely killed him. Taken away a father for three kids. Kate’s mentor. An Avenger.
And where would she be then? Would she be where she was now? In the Tower, as a New Avenger?
No. Maybe she would’ve been arrested. Maybe she would be in jail and Val wouldn’t care to bail her out. Or maybe she would, and Yelena would just keep going on Val’s missions.
Slowly sinking into her work.
Each mission getting more dangerous than the last.
Until maybe one was too much, and it was the end.
The rain raised in a crescendo, hammering against her window.
The shame, the pain.
It all hurt too much.
She barely pulled herself out of her stupor before making her way to the kitchen.
This was a time to drink away everything she felt. So, she was going to do just that.
Until she saw him.
John.
Standing in the pouring rain like nothing was happening.
Completely drenched.
Something in her tugged. She ran towards the balcony door and flung it open.
“John!” she shouted. “Come back inside! You’re going to get sick!”
No response.
“Shit,” Yelena muttered. She didn’t have an umbrella. She didn’t know where the closest one was.
She painfully, begrudgingly made her way out into the rain, letting it hit her. Her clothes clung to her, and she felt icky, but still she stood with John.
She looked at him.
Face wet, eyes blank, staring out into the city in front of them.
It was like he wasn’t there.
“John,” she said, loudly enough to be louder than the rain, but still quiet enough to be tender.
He finally turned to look at her.
“What the hell are you doing out here?” she asked, rain slicking her hair onto her face.
John didn’t respond. He looked down, leaning against the rail. Far enough to look over the edge of the balcony, and see the long descent to the ground below.
Yelena leaned and looked over with him.
“It seems enticing?” she guessed, sadly.
John nodded. “Whenever it gets bad, I…I come out here,” he finally spoke, voice cracked and thin like he hadn’t spoken in years. He gripped the railing tighter. “It’s just…it’s everything. Everything comes back and hurts.”
“Stop,” Yelena ordered. “Don’t call it everything. That is what overwhelms you. Pick one thing and deal with it first.”
John thought for a little bit. “It’s…the guy I killed. The Flagsmasher.”
Yelena waited.
“Sometimes I wonder what his life was like,” he continued. “If he had a family somewhere, waiting for him. What he liked to do. What would he have done if I let him live.”
A pause.
“And we’ll never know, because I took it away from him.”
Another crash of thunder from somewhere in the sky.
“Rage makes you do incredible things,” Yelena offered. “I…I almost killed Clint Barton in that way.”
John stared at her. “Clint Barton? You almost killed Hawkeye?”
Yelena hesitated. “I was hired,” she said. “By a woman. To kill him. And Val told me he was the one who killed my sister. ”
“Did he?” John asked.
“No,” Yelena said. “But I still came close. Very close to killing him. I was beating him relentlessly. I don’t know how many bones I broke.”
“Then what stopped you?”
Yelena looked at him. “He told me about Natasha,” she whispered, barely audible. “He reminded me of her. What she stood for.”
John nodded slightly, before turning back to look in front of them. “Well, you had that,” he said, voice tight. “I didn’t.”
Yelena moved to rest her right hand on John’s hand gripping the rail.
“And we can’t control that,” she said, softly.
John sniffled.
“We can only control how we react,” she finished.
“But that’s the thing wrong with me,” John spat out, eyes blinking away tears. “I don’t have control, and I never have. Never will.”
“All I can do is let it eat away at me, every single fucking day of my life. And God, I hope it takes me away. Because I can’t stand it anymore.”
His voice boomed and echoed off the walls of the Tower, somehow louder than the thunder.
“John…”
The rain continued pouring around them. Muffling, distorting, the things Yelena was thinking about that she could say to John.
She looked at him. He was breathing heavily, trembling all over. And definitely not from the cold of the rain.
“You’re not gonna listen to me if I try to comfort you, huh?” Yelena said.
John’s lips pressed in a line. He shook his head no.
“Alright. Then I will say this: we are kind of similar,” Yelena said. “I know what you feel. You might not think that, but I do. I see it.”
John said nothing as another thunderclap roared across the sky.
“I am going to go inside,” Yelena said, wiping aside a strand of hair. “I suggest you follow me.”
Then she turned, leaving John at the railing.
She almost didn’t expect him to follow.
She came back in, headed straight to the bathroom without looking back, and attempted to dry herself off with a towel. But it was no use. Her skin was still cold, her hair still sopping wet.
A noise from outside the bathroom caught her attention.
It was John. Wet hair sticking up, skin pale, clothes dripping, wet feet squeaking across the tiled floor. His eyes were red, something Yelena couldn’t have seen in the darkness outside.
He looked at her.
She looked back at him.
She offered the towel in her hands.
John shuffled towards her, feebly, toweling off only his hair and face.
“Get yourself new clothes, okay?” Yelena said softly.
John nodded, barely, before exiting the bathroom and going back to his room. Yelena heard the door open, and then promptly shut.
She sighed, out of exhaustion, returning to her room. She changed into more comfortable and definitely more dry clothes, but the coldness remained.
She looked out the door. John’s room was opposite hers.
As if on autopilot, she moved towards his door.
A knock.
“John? Can I come in?”
No response.
“John?”
A very faint, very audible hmph from inside the room.
“Dumbass, is that a yes or no?”
“HMPH.”
“I’m taking that as a yes,” she said, opening the door.
She found John sitting on the small couch in his room, holding a pillow over his chest. His hair was also still wet, but he was also in dry clothes.
Yelena’s heart twisted.
“Hey, big guy,” she said, coming over to sit next to him. The sofa shifted as she sat down.
She looked at him. He still looked pale, and looked like he had a runny nose.
“Shit, I think you’re already sick,” she said, trying to place her hand on his forehead to check his temperature.
She noticed the way John flinched. She noticed the way he leaned in afterwards, eyes closed.
“You like that, don’t you?” Yelena said, smiling and tousling his hair.
Another hmm from John, eyes still closed.
She noticed how nonverbal he was.
“Are you always quiet when it gets this bad?” she asked.
A nod.
“No offense, but doesn’t that make it worse? The thoughts get to you when it’s more silent.”
John hesitated, unable to find a nonverbal response.
“You know what? Nevermind,” Yelena said, sensing it wasn’t the time to deal with that issue. “Here, we can listen to music or watch Dr. Phil instead. Is that something you want?”
A thumbs-down.
Yelena frowned. “You already did your brooding outside. I’m not going to let you brood inside either. You have me now.”
John looked at her, clutching the pillow tighter against his chest.
“You want food?”
Another thumbs-down.
“Then what do you want?”
He hesitated.
And just shook his head no once more.
Yelena sighed. “Fine. We just sit here. But no brooding. I can tell when you’re brooding.”
John raised his eyebrows at her, questioning.
“I can and I will,” Yelena countered. She shuddered from the cold. “Damn. I’m getting blankets.”
She stood up and returned to her room, digging through her dresser until she found the two softest, thickest blankets she could find. She took the stuffed teddy bear Bob had gifted her too, for good measure.
“Alright,” she said, returning to John’s room, closing the door behind her. She tossed, no, threw the blanket at John, and it landed right over his face. “Get comfy.”
John wrapped the blanket around himself, but it was too small for him. So he tucked his legs under the rest of his body, bringing the blanket to be around his shoulders.
“I’m not sharing my blanket with you,” Yelena said. She handed him the teddy bear as she sat back down. “For you to hold.”
The bear rested atop the blanket. John just stared at it.
“So? Stop staring at him. Hold him, he’s going to get cold,” Yelena said, with joke concern.
John looked at Yelena, then the bear, then back at Yelena.
She frowned. “What’s wrong?”
She didn’t notice how John’s lower lip trembled. Or how his eyes got wetter.
He felt Yelena’s hand on his cheek, tugging his face towards her so she could see his face better.
“If you need to cry, you can cry,” she said, gently.
Something in John snapped.
He grabbed Yelena, pulling her towards him, like she was the last thing left to hold onto. He pressed his face into his shoulder, praying it would muffle how loud his sobs would be.
“Oh, John,” Yelena said, pressing her chin into the top of his head. She didn’t register her own tears flowing until the wetness coated her cheeks.
They both felt each other's warmth in stark contrast to how cold they had been before. Yelena felt John’s ragged breathing, heard his choked sobs. John smelled the laundry detergent that Yelena used on her clothes, felt her hand rubbing his back.
He felt her pull away from the hug, and he opened his eyes.
There was her face, just as tear-streaked as his, staring back at him. She used her thumbs to wipe away his tears.
“It’s okay,” Yelena said, bringing her forehead to touch his.
“Th—” he finally choked out. “Thank…you.”
Yelena smiled, before bringing him back into the hug, his face resting in the crook of her neck. Their limbs were tangled, the blankets were probably trapping them, but neither cared. They just needed to feel each other’s warmth.
“You’re a lot like Natasha,” Yelena muttered into John’s hair.
“You’re a lot like Lemar,” John said back, into Yelena’s shoulder.
Yelena exhaled, still continuing to rub John’s back. “You’re like my brother, okay?” she finally said, like she’d been waiting to say it. “I’m always going to love our bickering and your cooking. That’s why you’re going to stay here.”
A few more tears escaped John’s eyes before he responded.
“I love you, ‘Lena,” he muttered, holding her closer.
Yelena squeezed back. “Love you too, John.”