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“Hey, Mr. Barton! What’s up!” Peter called absentmindedly towards the vent Clint was currently hiding in, apparently trying to find out more about Peter.
He heard a pause, followed by a slight shuffle, and turned to watch as Clint reluctantly fell out of the vents.
“Oh, hey kid. I was just… looking around. Exploring and whatnot.”
“You sure you weren’t watching me?” Peter asked, eyebrow raised with a teasing smile.
“Uhhhh…”
“Yeah, you are a little loud when you talk to yourself.”
“Am not! No one else has caught me! Well except Nat but she’s Nat.” Clint grumbled defensively.
“Hm, if you say so. Maybe I just have better hearing, young ears, y’know.” Peter pointed to his ears with a playful smirk. “Maybe you guys are getting old.”
“Hey, I’ll have you know I lost my hearing in battle, not to old age. I swear, kids these days!” He threw his hands up as he seemed to be arguing with God for creating Peter’s generation.
“Wait, you lost your hearing?” The boy was looking curiously at Clint, a hint of guilt in his expression for his joke that now seemed to be in quite poor taste.
Clint looked back, shocked. He hadn’t meant to tell the kid that, but something about Peter was so genuine that he seemed to unintentionally lose his normal reservations around the boy. “Uh, yeah. A few too many explosions kinda cut out a lot of my hearing.”
“Oh, dang. I hadn’t thought of that being an issue before. Do you use hearing aids?”
“Yeah. I’m also learning sign. Makes it a bit easier, hearing aids aren’t the most pleasant to use.”
At that, much to Clint’s surprise, Peter perked up. “You know sign language? That’s so cool! Do you just know ASL or do you know a bunch?”
Clint let out a chuckle at the boy’s excitement. “Yeah, I’m fairly decent in ASL but I’m also working on starting to learn Russian Sign Language and International Sign.”
Peter looked like he was practically vibrating, wide eyes staring at Clint. “Oh my god Mr. Barton, that is so cool! I’ve always wanted to learn sign but there’s no courses offered at Midtown but that is so cool that you’re learning multiple sign languages, that’s awesome! How did you learn? Was it hard? Do you have a favorite sign? Do you have a sign name?”
Clint couldn’t help but smile back at the kid. He didn’t talk about signing very often because some people seemed to get really awkward about it, like they felt guilty for having good hearing still or something, so excitement was a nice change of pace.
“I’m taking courses through the public library. It took awhile because it was the first sign language I learned so it took some adjusting to a visual based language and grammar but it helps that I’m used to learning new languages. My favorite sign is bird,” he paused to show Peter the beak-like movement of his preferred animal, “and I do have a sign name. It’s an H for Hawkeye.” he showed Peter the sign of an H at his forehead. “My friend gave it to me. He was teaching the introductory ASL course I took and we ended up getting close after.” It was based on an unfortunate first design for his outfit he had shown the man a picture of, which had turned into an inside joke between the two.
As Peter opened his mouth to fire off more questions, he was cut off by Friday. “Mr. Parker, Boss is requesting you in the lab.”
“Oh shoot, I totally forgot the time. Sorry, Mr. Barton, I’ll talk to you later!” Peter called, rushing to the elevator. Clint waved to the boy with a soft smile.
***
In the elevator, after a moment of thought, Peter turned his head up to the ceiling.
“Fri?”
“Yes, Mr. Parker?”
“When are introductory courses for ASL available at the library?”
“They are available at two paces. One meets once a week on Mondays or Saturdays, and the other is for faster paced learning and meets four times a week, on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.”
As the doors opened, Peter asked “How much do they cost?”
“How much does what cost, Pete? You do realize you live with a billionaire, right?” Tony cut in, not looking up from his work.
“The courses offered are free. The program was endorsed by Mr. Stark. After consulting Mr. Barton, he set up a recurring donation to fund the two tracks and ensure they would be free.”
“Oh, the ASL courses, right. You weren’t supposed to tell anyone that, Fri. Kinda defeats the whole purpose of an anonymous donation.” Tony grumbled, though he didn’t look upset. “You thinking about taking courses, kid?”
“Yep!”
“Well, I’ll let Happy know the change of schedule so he can drive you there.”
“Thanks, Mr. Stark!”
***
A few weeks later, Peter found Clint sitting in the living room alone. He bounded over to the man, nervous smile on his face before stopping in front of him. Clint raised an eyebrow as Peter took a deep breath.
Peter raised his hands and, much to Clint’s surprise, started signing.
MY NAME P-E-T-E-R. HOW-YOU?
Clint smiled wide at the simple sentence, holding back a chuckle and responding.
MY NAME C-L-I-N-T, CLINT, he signed his name, ME GOOD. HOW-YOU?
Peter grinned back, ecstatic. ME GOOD. ME LEARN ASL ME.
They couldn’t get much farther in the conversation, having reached pretty much the end of Peter’s limited knowledge, but it was enough to get them both excited.
Over the next several months, Peter would come back from his lessons and practice with Clint, always thrilled to show him any new sign he learned and Clint happy to help him practice fingerspelling and grammar as much as he could help and enjoying watching him learn.
After reaching the limit of the courses offered at the library and catching up to Clint, who had been taking the slower track to accommodate his schedule with his family, the two joined a community college course. They spent many afternoons practicing signing with each other and attending events to learn and practice more.
Clint never expected to spend so much time with Tony’s kid-genius intern, but he quickly found himself looking forward to his chats with the kid, grateful for the break from his hearing aids and opportunity for connection. Clint eventually found himself preferring ASL as his predominant language and was thankful to have someone to share it with.