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Natasha had to admit, she liked Bobbi.
They had been flirting during the whole mission, their interaction growing more and more intense, until it was so palpable it could be cut with a knife.
Natasha had never been shy. She didn't mind acting on her feelings and taking whatever she wanted, whoever she wanted. There's was something different with Bobbi, though.
No. There was something different with Natasha herself. A new realisation.
She had Clint to blame for that, of course. The guy couldn't help but run his mouth, sharing stuff he had learned from Kate and her bunch of teenage vigilantes and probably the Internet too.
While half-listening to his rambling, something had clicked. Natasha had suddenly had a new perspective, a new understanding of herself. It was life-changing.
And now, with this thing with Bobbi growing more and more heated, she felt scared like she had rarely been. She was used to squelch those stupid, inconvenient feelings though.
Until Bobbi kissed her.
It wasn't a surprise. Natasha knew whatever it was between them was reciprocal of course, and Bobbi was considerate and wouldn't have stollen a kiss out of the blue.
It elicited something akin of panic in Natasha, however. Again, she squelched it. Or so she thought.
"Imagine this: you, me and the best pizza napoletana in Naples. Whaddya say?"
Somebody asking her out was nothing new, and even if she liked Bobbi, Natasha wasn't a bashful lover of any kind. She was way too old for that.
And yet.
Natasha turned down Bobbi's offer, giving a pretext neither of them believed could be true.
It could have been the end of it, but of course in their line of work, they had to cross path again and again. Natasha couldn't just ignore Bobbi. And that silly crush started growing into real feelings.
She had missed the opportunity though—or so she thought. Maybe that was what she chose to believe. She was the Black Widow after all, she could create an opportunity. She didn't need to, though.
"I'm not imagining the thing between us, right?" Bobbi asked, in the middle of a stakeout one night.
Natasha raised a pregnant eyebrow by way of a response.
"Thought so. Then why did you turned me down that time in Italy?"
Why did she? Natasha wasn't even sure herself.
"I like you, that's not the problem."
"Then what is? Is it because of Clint? Of Barnes?"
Of course not, Natasha thought. Even if they were on a break at the moment, James and she had an understanding they could see whoever they wanted, and that wouldn't impact what they had together. She also knew Clint and Bobbi's on-again-off-again relationship had the same clause.
Natasha could say it's not you, it's me, but how cliché and disrespectful would that be? Bobbi deserved better, even if that was the truth.
"Do you like sex?" Natasha asked instead.
Bobbi blinked, clearly taken aback by this peculiar question.
"Uh, yes?" Bobbi's eyes narrowed. "Don't you?"
Natasha half-shrugged.
"I don't exactly care about it."
"That's not a real answer."
Natasha sighed. No, it wasn't, not really.
Natasha couldn't summarise her life story, the feelings she had hidden her whole life from everyone, even herself, and how she still didn't even understand how it all fitted together. She had to try anyway.
"I'm somewhere on the asexual spectrum," she admitted, using the words she had learned during her 3AM Internet searches. "I'm still figuring out what it means for me. This is why my relationship with James is on the back burner at the moment."
"Oh. Okay."
Bobbi seemed to process the new information for a moment before stating: "It's not a problem for me, I think. I mean, neither the fact you're asexual, nor that you're still figuring things out are deal-breaker. If you want to go out, offer's still on the table."
"Really?"
"Mhm."
Natasha smiled, the kind of soft smiles she saved for special moments like this. "Okay, then."
"I want you to say it. Come on, say it."
Natasha rolled her eyes, but she obliged.
"I'm asexual," she declared. "But I still wanna be with you."
"Sweet," Bobbi smiled, a lopsided smirk that wouldn't look out of place on Clint's face. Those two spent too much time together. "So, it's not Italy, but I know a great pizzeria in Manhattan. Can I pick you up at, let's say, 7 tomorrow night?"
"It's a date."