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Two of a Kind (Working on a Full House); 05/23-night-Clint & Bobbi
Topic Started: Nov 15 2013, 10:17 PM (207 Views)
Mockingbird
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[cont'd from Drink With Me]

Sometime between the time they'd gone out this morning and the time they'd finished up in Utah, finished up in the Infirmary, and gotten to the party, some of the mechanical types had managed to get the transport system working again. That made getting back up to the Helicarrier easier than pulling a teleporter out of the party to take them back and forth and in no time flat, the platform discs that seemingly defied gravity had taken them from just outside the strip club straight up to the cloaked helicarrier stationed in a hover pattern overhead.

It'd been a while since she'd last set foot on this flying fortress, but that didn't mean she'd fogotten her way around. Bobbi didn't even have to think about where she was going as their transport disk docked, they hopped on the elevator, and then made their way up to the decks above, where the personal quarters were. A couple of minutes later and they were at their room and a quick palm scan had them in the door.

"Home sweet home," the blonde quipped as she stepped through the door, sending a half-smile back Clint's way in the process. Maybe not home, exacly. Not in the way she thought of it now, but in some ways it was almost like coming home for her. SHIELD was where she'd started, all those years ago. Before she met Clint, before she'd ever even imagined ending up with the Avengers.

Agent 19. She'd worked alone in those days and she'd liked it that way. It had always been how she'd worked best. Or so she thought.

Right up until she'd met Clint Barton. He might've thought she turned his whole life upside down at the time, but he'd definitely returned the favor. And kept right on doing it. She wouldn't have it any other way.

Now, she couldn't imagine her life without him, knew she wanted to get back to that life they should've been able to have before all this started. The one they'd put on hold because there were more important things going on than just the regular lives of two people in costumes.

Had always figured they'd pick back up on that, if they both came through this (and hadn't really ever let herself think they wouldn't), but hadn't really guessed how much she'd counted on that, subconsciously, until today, maybe. Just like she hadn't realized how much of the guilt over what happened to Kate Hawk was still carrying around with him.

In the infirmary, back down at the party, there'd been a million words she wanted to say, sitting right there on the tip of her tongue. Once they got up here, Bobbi had figured they'd all come spilling out, but as she reached up to take the communicator out of her ear and lay it on the night table, she realized they'd all vanished. She didn't know what the hell to say or how to say it or where to start.

"I'm gonna change out of this uniform," the blonde settled on, for lack of anything sensible or relevant to take it's place as she turned back to send a faint smile Clint's way. Maybe while she did that, some damned thing or other would come to her.

Story of their lives. Everything to say and neither of them being able to figure out how to say it half the time. Which was still better than all the time, because god knows they'd been there, too. But this once she'd have wished it'd landed on the side of that other half.
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Hawkeye
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The Resistance had its own helicarrier.

A few days and one game of drunken beer pong later and there was still part of Clint that had trouble believing it. When Wisdom had first passed along the news the amaranthine archer had accused him straight out of putting him on. He’d also wondered if he’d simply misheard him and that they were simply planning to capture one. There were times where you couldn’t quite tell with the guy, and for all Clint knew, it was somehow part of an attempt on Resistance Romeo’s part to get back into Jen’s pants.

He must have anticipated a little skepticism, especially after all the flak he got for the news about Cyclops and Jean Grey, back from the dead. Next thing they knew, Wisdom was showing them the proof, right over the webcam. Carol must have been really falling down on the job to let something like that happen.

And then they found out Carol had been captured, too.

By then, Wisdom must have decided he enjoyed putting a look of stunned surprise on Clint’s face, because no sooner had he gotten a chance to absorb that, and he went and showed them Cap’s shield. The victories were coming one right after another, and now the last Camp had fallen. Everyone’s spirits were about as high as Clint had ever seen. Things finally seemed to be going their He should have been right there with them. Hell he was with them. He was looking forward to all this being over as much as anyone. To an end to the war, an end to all the suffering and to getting their lives back.

There was just that one matter lodged in his mind that refused to go away, and ignoring it just wasn’t an option. He was going to have to face it, to figure out why it was even still there and try to do something about it. Preferably without Doc Samson trying to shrink his head. This was just between him and Bobbi, and even though they hadn’t said a thing about it since Utah, it hadn’t been hard to see it was every bit as much on her mind as his.

He’d thought they’d said it all. Bobbi knew how hard losing Kate had hit him. God only knew where he’d been if she hadn’t been there to help him through it. Or if she hadn’t been there at all, but he’d gotten very, very good at not dwelling on those kinds of thoughts.

Somehow being on the helicarrier made everything even harder to ignore, but there was a comfortable familiarity to the place as well. It may have been a while, but they both knew their way around SHIELD’s pride and joy pretty much by heart. Clint had had a good long laugh when he found out it was now called the ‘Awesome.’ Just the kind of thing flamehead would call it. He was content to just to call it home. At least for now.

"Home sweet home," Bobbi said as she opened the door to their room and stepped through it. She gave him a little smile over her shoulder, and he stepped over the threshold to join her. “Be it ever so humble,” he quipped back, closing the door behind him. More like a modestly furnished room, but it was practically the Ritz compared to how they’d been living. And for Bobbi, especially, it really was like coming back home, in a way. Her history with SHIELD went back to before she’d met him. Before she’d even gone by the name Mockingbird.

Bobbi had turned his life upside down from the moment she literally turned him upside down. Bow versus bo staff. It had been one hell of a way to get to know each other. Not many couples could really say they’d had their first fight before they’d had their first date. But that was one of the things he loved about her, and thank god it had never changed after all this time. And it had quickly become a mutual effect. At least, he was pretty sure that’s what Mock would say. In a roundabout way, all this was yet another example.

He was standing there like a lump, now. Looking at her and running over the same thoughts all over again, like a dog chasing its tail. Bursting to get it all out, but completely at a loss to know how Bobbi would feel about it. Not sure he knew how he felt about it himself for that matter. Or even if he fully understood it. God’s sake, what should he even say to start?

Should he start? Or let Bobbi? She looked like she wanted to say something. He recognized the way she got when she was right on the verge, but all she read was take the communicator out of her ear and set it on the night table. "I'm gonna change out of this uniform," his wife said, giving him another attempt at a smile.

Clint let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. “Yeah, good plan,” he said, unsure if dancing around the subject made him less tense or more tense. Still, at least it was a direction. He reached up to his ear the pluck out his own communicator. “I’ll grab us something to drink,” he offered.

Which basically meant the beer they’d smuggled out from last night and stowed in the mini fridge brought in from their old headquarters. Not much of a selection, there, but it was cold, and he doubted Bobbi would turn it down.
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She was going to change out of her uniform.

Not exactly the conversation starter she'd been looking for. All the things she wanted to say, or should be saying, or should be figuring out how to say, and that's what came out of her mouth. God.

Shaking her head slightly at herself as she put the earpiece down on the night table, Bobbi wondered not for the first time why the hell she hadn't managed to get better at this after all these years. It wasn't like they hadn't had plenty of chances to practice.

Okay, maybe that wasn't entirely fair. She had gotten better. So had Clint. They'd made sure of that, because they liked being married and generally wanted to avoid both divorce and the urge to strangle each other. So they'd gotten better, especially with the big things and this was definitely a big thing.

Maybe a couple of big things, but it still didn't come easy. Not for her, even with Clint. Loving him, that came easy. Sometimes, way back when, she'd thought maybe too easy, but that wasn't anything she'd worried about in a long time. Talking to him, Mockingbird still wished that could come that effortlessly.

That she could just summon it like other people did. Dive in head first without having to give it any thought, or having to wonder how. Like Jen did, like Jan did. God, even Natasha and Greer were better at this than she was Bobbi was pretty sure.

Her one comfort, if you could call it that, was that Clint wasn't doing any better. And she wasn't sure that was all that comforting.

Here they were, in what passed for home now and felt more like it than maybe anything had since that little apartment in the city, humble or not. And she still couldn't manage to get her tongue to form the words she wanted as she looked back at him and started talking about changing clothes instead.

“Yeah, good plan,” Clint agreed, almost seeming relieved, like he'd dodged a bullet and a crease or two crinkled her forehead. How was she supposed to take that? Was he relieved she hadn't jumped right in? Didn't he want to talk about it now? If he didn't, what did that mean?

Round and round her mind went, like the circles they were beating around that Sequoia sized bush.

“I’ll grab us something to drink,” her still often inexplicable to her husband offered as he took off his own communicator. Bobbi nodded as even that faint smile faded a little at the edges, moving back toward a thoughtful expression that probably made no sense at all in relation to what he'd just said.

"Yeah, thanks, Sport," she replied a little distractedly as she brushed her hair back off her shoulders, undid the belt on her uniform, set it aside and tugged down the zipper of the uniform itself. "I wouldn't mind that at all. Too bad we didn't think to grab something from the club while we were down there."

Not that it mattered, the leftover beer would be fine. But it was something to say, again, until her brain supplied something better, or at least figured out what 'better' was. God, she had a PhD for fuck's sake, you'd think that would mean she could at least figure out how to talk to her own husband by now.
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Hawkeye
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Jesus Christ, Clint, what the Hell?

They’d barely shut the door and he was already groping around for something to say. No wonder all this had never even crossed his mind, much less managed to become an actual conversation, before now. He’d been rehearsing this in his mind from the moment they got back from Utah. He’d known exactly what he was going to say. Somewhere in his mind he still did, but all the words had scattered like quail the moment it looked like he was going to actually use them.

So instead it was Bobbi to speak first, announcing a change of clothes. That sounded good to Clint, mostly because it gave him something to agree on. She could have announced a desire to take up knitting effective immediately and he’d have told her it was a great idea.

There was no reason for it to be this hard. Even for them. Half of it might be an exception, and he was braced for that. But the other half was different. They both wanted to do this and they’d worked hard at finding ways to talk to each other, especially for things that were as important as this.

Until they figured it out, though, he was good with filling the silence with whatever. Changing clothes, beer, it really didn’t matter as long as they weren’t starting at each other and saying nothing. Bobbi gave him a nod at the offer of something to drink. "Yeah, thanks, Sport," she said in an odd tone of voice, as if her mind was somewhere entirely different. Which was ridiculous. How could she not be thinking about the same thing just as much as him.

Unless she didn’t want to think about it right now. Had he completely misread her signals and was pushing her into a conversation she’d rather avoid? If so, what was he going to do about that? It opened up a whole new avenue of possibilities and dilemmas he didn’t even know where to begin dealing with.

Crap. Now he was right back to being lost again. Or more lost than he already was. Just when he thought he was getting close, something else seemed to come along to drive him right back to dancing around the subject.

And what did that expression on her face mean? It wasn’t really a frown, but there was something going on in her head while she removed her belt and worked down the zipper of her uniform. What it was, though, was anyone’s guess. "I wouldn't mind that at all. Too bad we didn't think to grab something from the club while we were down there."

Right, he was getting beer. Not watching his wife take her clothes off. Even if that was a sight he never got tired of. Prodding himself into motion, Clint made his way to the mini-fridge and tugged the door open. Had that been a subtle gripe about being rushed out of there? He gave his head a slight shake to dismiss the idea.

“Ah, I say let ’em have the good stuff,” he said dismissively, reaching in to grab two well-chilled bottles. He bent back up, nudged the door shut with one foot, and held the beers up for display. “We’ve got everything we need right here, right, Babe?” And they did, in all honesty. He wasn’t even talking about the beer. His lips quirked up in a smile that felt a bit more natural.

That, at least, always came easy.

A stray thought occurred then, and he set the beers down on top of the square appliance. “I should probably change into something else, too,” he confessed sheepishly. Yeah, standing around in his stealth suit didn’t make much sense given what his wife was doing. Way to keep up, Clint. How on earth did other couples manage to make this look like it took no effort at all?
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Ignoring the elephant in the room.

Until right now, Bobbi had thought that was one've the stupidest sayings she'd ever heard. Anyone who'd ever seen an elephant (or a wolly mammoth, which was close enough to the same thing) up close would think that wasthe stupidest thing they'd ever heard. The damned things were huge. If they were in the room, there was no way in hell to ignore them.

Or so her rather practical and literal mind had insisted right up until she and Clint started having this conversation. Or not having this conversation. God.

Weren't they supposed to be better at this by now?

More times than not these days they were, she mused as she tried to figure out exactly what those tones and expressions on her husband's face actually meant and just ended up chasing her own indecision and uncertainty around in circles. Yeah, most of the time, they were but this was different. Big.

Kate big, and every time she thought about Clint blurting that out in the middle of that Camp, all the words that had been on the tip of her tongue down in the strip club dried up again. Vanished as she remembered the look on his face that day he'd walked in the door holding that kid's bow and looking wrecked in a way she'd never seen before and never wanted to see again.

It felt like stepping into a minefield that could blow up in their face and that was a feeling that was a little too familiar and that Bobbi'd hoped never to meet again. Maybe they should just forget it, even if that put that weird feeling of loss right back in the pit of her stomach as she absently agreed to beer, chased her own thoughts around in her head and talked about how they should've grabbed something from the club before they'd taken off because she couldn't manage to get anything else out of her mouth.

Uniform unzipped, she shrugged it off her shoulders, let it fall to her waist, then slid it down over her hips and sloughed it off like the second skin it felt like now and then. She could probably use a shower, but it could wait. If she had to hang onto this conversation, or the idea of this conversation, by her fingernails then so be it.

“Ah, I say let ’em have the good stuff,” Clint replied from over by the mini-fridge as she looked around for something to pull on, letting out a soft snort as an expression of how 'good' she thought anything from the club would probably be. Spotting one've Clint's shirts draped over a chair, she shrugged, grabbed that, shoved her arms and head through the appropriate places and called it good. “We’ve got everything we need right here, right, Babe?”

Bottles clanked and the door of the fridge thumped shut as Bobbi pulled her hair out of the collar of the shirt and looked over his way. Clint was standing there with that smile on his face that made him look like a little boy as often as not and she was smiling back before she even realized it.

"Right, Sport," she agreed, finally feeling a little of that tightness in her shoulders and spine, and her head and chest, lessen. Everything they needed. Not the damned beer that Hawk was setting back down on top of the mini-fridge (did that mean he was ready to talk? Was he starting? Should she?). That was the big thing, right? Whatever else happened, they already had everything they needed. Right here. Right now.

It wasn't a lesson they'd learned easy, but they'd learned it. They could figure this out. One way or another.

“I should probably change into something else, too,” Clint interjected, thank god, before she could start looping around in her own head again, despite her conviction not to. Even if they were back to talking about clothes again, she'd take it and did, latching onto that like a passenger on the Titanic to a piece of driftwood.

"Yeah, sure, Babe," she agreed, smile softening in the face of that sheepish look that made him look even more like a little kid than it had any right to and was adorable as hell. And yeah, So she was using that to stall for time a little as she went back to grasping for a way to start this. Because, dammit, one of them had to or they'd be talking about beer and changing clothes until they passed out from exhaustion and spend the whole next day pulling their hair out and driving themselves nuts.

And probably driving everybody else nuts in the process.

"Might as well get comfortable while we've got the chance." Yeah, that was a great start. Jesus, Bobbi. Perching on the edge of the bed, she reached over for the hairbrush, running it through her hair for some damned thing to do with her hands besides maybe strangle herself. After a second, blue eyes watching her husband sidelong (frustration or no frustration, that was a view she never got tired of), Mockingbird took a deep breath and added more quietly, "It wasn't your fault, Clint." Words she'd said before, years ago, and it brought back those slightly sick, sinking feelings she remembered.

Lowering the brush to her lap, she turned to face him and finally managed to say, "Have you been holding onto that all this time, Babe?"
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Hawkeye
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Beers: Check.

So what if they hadn’t grabbed anything on the way up? They had each other. They’d always have each other. That was all they really needed. It was enough of an acknowledgement to bring a smile to Clint’s face in spite of his frustrating inability to just get on with it.

Mock gave him a smile of her own, though. The kind that said she understood what he’d meant and that she agreed. "Right, Sport," she said, looking a little more relaxed than she had a second ago. Bobbi might not smile as often as Jen or Jan, but when she did, you knew she felt that smile all the way to her toes. Clint loved that about her, and seeing it made him feel a little less like he was trying to explode out of his own skin.

Speaking of skin, what was he still doing in his stealth suit? Bobbi had thrown on one of his shirts and god damn she made that look hot, and her he was still looking like he was about to run off to a mission. Feeling like a bit of a yahoo, Clint announced that he should follow his wife’s example and change clothes. Because obviously that was what they were here to discuss. Clothes and beer. Jesus, Clint.

"Yeah, sure, Babe," Bobbi said, because they both seemed to have been caught up in an endless cycle of small talk and agreeing with each other about the small talk. Her smile had softened, which was a comfort, but they were getting nowhere fast. Bobbi seemed to be having just as much trouble as Clint, which wasn’t all that much of a comfort. This was turning out to be much harder than he’d expected, and if it kept up they were going to be basket cases in the morning, driving each other and everyone around them crazy.

Unzipping his top, Clint pulled it off, still at a loss for what to say. He heard Bobby take in a slight breath, and his ears perked up even as he dumped the garment on the floor. Maybe she was going to kick things off? "Might as well get comfortable while we've got the chance."

Or they could do that a little bit more. “You read my mind, Hon,” he said, because why not add borderline hyperbole to the mix? Could he actually be getting worse? Bobbi had sat herself down on the edge of the bed and grabbed a hairbrush to run through her hair. Clint removed his pants, mentally chastising himself.

Well, at least they weren’t just standing around staring at each other. If they just kept themselves occupied, eventually momentum would get them where they needed to be. Maybe. Something had to pierce the bubble they’d surrounded themselves with or he was probably going to start scre-

Bobbi took in a deep breath, jarring Clint out of his latest round of frustration. "It wasn't your fault, Clint."

The words were quiet, but they still hit deep. He’d heard them before, years ago, and it was like he’d suddenly gone right back to that moment. It felt like his heart weighed a ton. He stood there, shoulders slumped, head lowered. His throat tightened and he swallowed uncomfortably, his larynx bobbing up and down.

"Have you been holding onto that all this time, Babe?"

Clint’s head rose quickly to meet with his wife’s blue eyes. She was looking directly at him, her brush resting on her lap. “No!” he said hastily, then, backing off, changed it to, “Yes? Maybe?” he sighed in defeat and a helpless look came over him. “I don’t know, Babe.”

He spotted a pair of pants he’d left on the floor not far and bent down for it. “I thought I was past it. I really did.” He lifted the pants, unconsciously bundling it as he looked up at Bobbi again. “But, you saw how I got when Jen suggested we add Brian to the team…” He’d been utterly against it, and he had no trouble admitting he’d been unreasonable. When he met him, he’d been prepared to let him down easy. To tell him that as far as he was concerned, the whole mentoring thing just was not a good idea.

He’d changed his mind on less than five minutes after he started talking with him. He was such a good kid. Charming. Sensible. If Clint had realized then what was going on in his head at the time, that might have made his objections stronger. Instead, he was right on board with everyone else. And that wasn’t going to change, even now.

“…And then when I thought you were…” he continued, folding his arms against his chest, now cradling his bundled pants. “I guess I panicked.” He gave her an apologetic look. It felt like his feet were rooted to the floor.

“Kate wasn’t my fault. I know that. But she was my responsibility.”
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Comfortable. Sure. They'd just get comfortable.

What the hell was wrong with her?

“You read my mind, Hon,” Clint replied, making her wish she could do just that. This whole damned thing would have to be easier if they were both telepaths. Right?

Jesus, no, Bobbi decided, less than half a second later as she imagined all the different kinds of catastrophes that would probably lead to. God. Okay, so. She'd just sit here while Clint changed clothes, brush her hair and pretend this thing wasn't sitting there between them.

Maybe try not to pull her hair out by the handfuls in frustration in the process. Better than strangling herself, she guessed, but not by much. Or she could just take a deep breath, put on her big girl panties and say something.

Bobbi actually gave that a try, then wished to hell she hadn't. It was like watching all the air being let out of him. He just stood there, head bowed, shoulders slumped, swallowing hard enough she could actually see it. Like he was trying to swallow back down everything those words suddenly brought up.

That sick feeling of her own moved from her stomach to her chest and sat there like a stone. Dammit, she'd never been any good at this. Always been crap at really talking about the things that mattered, or knowing how to talk about them. Maybe she was better than she used to be, back when she was asking Nick Fury, of all people, for marital advice, but that wasn't saying much.

It wasn't easy and probably never would be for her, but this was one've those things that was important. Maybe that made it even harder, but she'd managed to get started so she might as well keep going. Because she had to know, or it would nag and gnaw at her. Had he been holding onto this - the stuff with Kate she thought they'd worked through years ago - all this time without her even knowing?

How the hell had she managed to miss that?

His head jerked up, blue eyes meeting hers and that knot in her chest constricted a little more. “No!” he said hastily, too damned hastily, she thought. Sure enough, “Yes? Maybe?” he sighed in defeat and a helpless look came over him that had a catch forming in her own throat. That look froze her in place with memories she'd hoped they'd never have to relive. “I don’t know, Babe.”

"Clint," she began, not sure what she was going to say or how, but maybe this wasn't the time to talk about this after all. It was a cop out, probably, but maybe...maybe it didn't need to be talked about. Not if it was going to put that look back on his face. The one she'd seen five years ago.

But he was already grabbing for his pants, spilling it out before she could come up with anything else to follow that with. “I thought I was past it. I really did.” He lifted the pants, unconsciously bundling it as he looked up at Bobbi again. “But, you saw how I got when Jen suggested we add Brian to the team…”

"Yeah. Yeah, I did," she confirmed, nodding slowly and watching him with such a mixed bag of thoughts and feelings even she wasn't sure there was any way to sort them out. He'd been dead set against it and she hadn't been completely sold on the idea of it herself. Taking on more kids to mentor, it hadn't seemed like the greatest timing in the world.

But Brian was a good kid. All of them she'd met seemed to be. So she'd kept the objections to herself, because in the end those kids had earned the right to learn and to be involved.

“…And then when I thought you were…” Hawk started again and she felt that knot tighten yet again, sitting there on her breastbone. Felt that surge of...something. Hell, she didn't know what to call it, because how did you feel loss for something you'd never had to start with? No, she wasn't good with this, not any of it. She'd never cared much that she wasn't, except when it came to Clint. With him, she'd always cared and that wasn't always easy, either, but she still wouldn't change it, even if she could. “I guess I panicked.”

"Yeah, I know," Bobbi assured him, with a faint smile that probably fell short of the reassurance she was aiming for. Still didn't know how to feel about that, either. Not something you wanted to hear, that the idea of having kids with you gave your husband a panic attack. No, it wasn't exactly like that and on an intellectual level she knew it. But there was still the sting of hurt under that and she ended up staring down at her hairbrush, plucking out the strands of blonde hair stuck in the bristles one by one.

“Kate wasn’t my fault. I know that. But she was my responsibility.” He was still standing there, holding onto that pair of pants like they were a Kate substitute. The thing he had to protect. Like he had wanted to protect Kate, felt like he should've, and couldn't.

What a damned mess.

"She wasn't a little kid, Sport," she pointed out quietly. Maybe it wasn't what he wanted to hear, but it was the truth. "And Kate wasn't stupid," Anything but. That girl had been smart, headstrong, clever and skilled. She knew how to get what she wanted, "but she wasn't going to listen to reason when it came to Eli and that Camp. What the hell were we supposed to do, tie her down? Lock her in a closet?" Bobbi shook her head, looking over at Clint and wanting to alternately hug the hell out of him and smack him over the head. She loved him more than anything, but what were they supposed to do about this now?

"You know as well as I do, that's what it would've took and she wouldn't have thanked us for it." Meeting his eyes across that space that always seemed farther than it should be at times like this, Bobbi took a breath and set the hairbrush back over on the nightstand. "And she wouldn't have wanted you beating yourself up over it forever because things went wrong, Clint."

They couldn't control everything, they couldn't protect everyone. Sometimes, they couldn't even protect themselves. If they hadn't learned one other damned thing in the last five years, they all should've learned that.
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Of course he’d tried to veto mentoring Brian sight unseen. The kid had nearly died. He had still been recuperating in the infirmary when they went to meet him. Clint had been resolute against doing even that much, and Mock had seen the whole thing.

"Yeah. Yeah, I did," she said with a serious nod. She’d expressed some strong reservations herself, but once Jen and Greer had their minds set on something, there was almost no talking them out of it.

It never even occurred to Clint that his objections might have been related to Kate.

Not until Bobbi had brought up kids of their own. It had been nothing more than an offhand remark, but it had triggered something in him that he didn’t understand until their argument had reached that sudden and awkward conclusion.

Oh, God. Bobbi seemed to almost shrink right in front of him, and there was no missing the sudden sting in her eyes. The regret. Disappointment? He’d hurt her, he knew that much, though he wasn’t sure what he’d just said to cause it. Why did this have to be so damned hard? Was he so messed up he couldn’t even talk about it without making Bobbi feel worse than he already had?

Did the thought of having children make her uncomfortable? Maybe she’d snapped at him back in Utah in part to cover that up. That made a certain amount of sense. God knew how private Bobbi could be when it came to some her feelings, especially the less pleasant ones. And here he was, worrying at it some more, like a loose tooth he couldn’t leave alone. Nice going, Clint. If that was how she felt, he’d… well, he couldn’t really blame her, even if the thought came with a confusing mess of emotions he couldn’t even pretend to make sense of right now.

Instead he just gathered his pants up in his hands, not even paying attention to himself as he tried to soften the blow by explaining that he’d panicked. It didn’t mean anything more than that. Or it didn’t have to.

A smile. Not much of one, and probably more for his benefit. Her heart didn’t really seem into it. "Yeah, I know," she said. Trying to reassure him, but there was a hollowness around the edges, as sure as the look in her eyes had been. Whatever was upsetting her, that hadn’t helped at all. Her eyes dropped down to her hairbrush and started picking at it, tugging out bits of hair. She always fussed with her hands when she got like that.

He needed to keep talking. At the very least to answer the damn question she’d asked to begin with. Kate. Why was he still letting that haunt him, when he’d promised he wasn’t going to? When he’d been so sure himself that he’d managed to move on. No, she wasn’t his fault. She’d been his responsibility, though. It had been his job to train her, to guide her, to protect her and put her welfare above his own. But she was dead, and he was still here.

She was so young.

"She wasn't a little kid, Sport," Bobbi said, as if she knew exactly what he was thinking. The weight in his chest seemed to grow a little heavier at the words. He dropped his gaze down, looking at the bundled in his arms without really seeing it. "And Kate wasn't stupid," she added.

“No, she wasn’t,” Clint agreed, nodding mechanically. A faint trace of fondness had crept into his voice. No matter how much it hurt that she was gone, he would never forget the things that made her so great. She wasn’t stupid. She could think circles around him and still have room to solve a Rubik’s Cube blindfolded.

"but she wasn't going to listen to reason when it came to Eli and that Camp. What the hell were we supposed to do, tie her down? Lock her in a closet?" Clint could hear the frustration in her voice, but whether it was directed at him or Kate, he couldn’t tell. Probably him, though. He lifted his eyes to see her looking at him. Her eyes were unyielding as they met his. "You know as well as I do, that's what it would've took and she wouldn't have thanked us for it."

It was the truth. Clint knew it just as well deep down as he knew it in his head. She’d have been furious if they’d even tried, and never would have forgiven them. It was something she’d had to do, and they hadn’t had the right to stop her, even if it meant the difference between her death and her being alive today.

Bobbi filled her lungs with a gust of air and banished her hairbrush to the nightstand. "And she wouldn't have wanted you beating yourself up over it forever because things went wrong, Clint."

Nodding, Clint’s arms wrapped tighter around the rolled up pants he was holding to his chest. “When you’re right, you’re right, Babe,” he said. Clinging on to it like this, wearing it like a scar, it wasn’t doing anything but hurt him. And by extension it was hurting Bobbi. If he couldn’t figure this out, to really move past it for his own sake, he was going to do it for hers. He loved her too much, they’d worked too hard to build a solid foundation underneath that love, for him not to make it work.

Clint took the few short steps over to the bed, turned, and sank on it, sitting next to Bobbi. He set his pants down onto his lap and heaved a morose sigh that was actually more frustration with himself. “I can just picture her yelling at me about it, too,” he said, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his lips. He turned his head to meet Bobbi’s eyes. A stray lock of hair had wandered in, and he reached up to brush it out of the way, then lowered his hand to gently cup her cheek.

“I’m sorry, Bobbi-bird,” he said in a soft voice. “I guess I had it buried so deep I just never noticed, and I needed a little help to realize it was still there. But you’re right.” He’d already said that, hadn’t he? Well, that was probably something he couldn’t say too much. “I didn’t fail her. The world did. She’d want me to go on trying to fix the world, not let myself get just as broken. She wouldn’t want me to let it stop me from living my life, and going for the things I want in it.”
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Kate. No surprise, really, that it came back to her in the end. Shouldn't have been, anyway, Bobbi realized, but it was something she thought they'd worked through. That they'd managed to put into the past, liked they'd worked to put those awful months of fighting and separation that had very nearly destroyed everything they had together into the past.

They'd worked to rebuild their lives, back then. All these years last years, they'd worked and fought for the right to have lives again. They were so close now. It was almost in reach.

Why hadn't she realized the specter of Kate was still there? Still haunting Clint with that same self-blame that he'd carried after it happened? Even if he hadn't realized it himself, Bobbi felt like she should've.

Not his fault, but his responsibility. Yeah, Hawk would see it that way. He always did. Took so much responsibility on himself, focused so hard on not screwing up. It'd been part of their problems back in the WCA. Not all of them, by any means, and she'd done her own part to add to that, but it had definitely been part of it.

He always tried so hard to live up to those ideals in his head. They'd lost Kate and it was a personal failure for him. That young, headstrong, brilliant girl. There one day and gone the next.

Kate wasn't a little kid, though. Or at all stupid, except in the way that all teenagers were sometimes stupid. Young, headstrong, maybe too smart and clever for her own good, just like she'd said. Bobbi had been the same way at her age. Hadn't been much older than Kate when she'd joined SHIELD, because she had a taste for more than working in a research lab the rest of her life.

“No, she wasn’t,” Clint agreed, head bowed and nodding, trace of emotion there in his voice that made her chest tighten again. He'd adored her. They both had, but there'd been a bond between that girl and Clint that went deeper.

But even with that, Kate wasn't going to listen to reason. Not when it came to Eli. Not when it came to the Bronx. God knew they'd tried, her and Clint both. Tried to talk to her, tried to reason with her, but even when Kate had been agreeing with them, Bobbi'd known she wasn't. It had frustrated the hell out of her then, it still did now. What should they have done? Tie her up? Lock her in the closet? It would've taken that and that girl sure as hell wouldn't have thanked them for it.

She'd have never forgiven them, and Bobbi could understand that, too, maybe in a way Clint couldn't. That need - that drive - to go it alone. Do it yourself. Prove you could, no matter what anybody else said or what anybody else thought. Even if it was stupid and you knew it, because it was that important and you knew you could beat the odds.

Only once in a while, you couldn't.

Kate couldn't and it had been the kind of lesson you didn't live to learn from and that still killed her. But dammit, she also knew that the Kate Bishop she'd known would've never wanted them, either of them and most especially Clint, to spend the rest of their lives beating themselves up over it.

Whether any of that got through, hell, Bobbi didn't know. Times like this, she never really knew. Clint nodded again, tightened his hold on his pants like they were everything he ever wanted to protect and if he just held onto them tight enough it'd all be okay. God, she loved him, but she never knew what to say to him, or how to say it, or if what she managed to say made any difference for the better or for the worse.

“When you’re right, you’re right, Babe,” Clint told her and what the hell did that even mean? Shut up, Bobbi, you're making it worse? That he actually understood what she was trying to say and he really did agree with her? Sitting there looking at him wasn't giving her the first damned clue so there went her thoughts, chasing themselves around in circles again.

The next things she knew, though, he crossed the short space to the bed and dropped down next to her, finally letting go his death grip on his pants enough to lay them in his lap. The breath he let out sounded as aggravated as she felt, but whether that was at her or the whole damned thing, she didn't know that, either.

How in the name of God did other people make it look so easy? You didn't see Sue and Reed Richards having so much trouble just talking to eachother.

“I can just picture her yelling at me about it, too,” Clint began, ghost of a smile tugging at his lips as he turned, meeting her eyes. Bobbi felt a similar tugging at the corners of her own mouth, despite the frustration and mental flailing that still had her considering pulling her hair out at least a little.

He reached up and pushed a stray strand of hair she hadn't even noticed out of her face, then his palm settled against her cheek. “I’m sorry, Bobbi-bird,” he said in a soft voice. “I guess I had it buried so deep I just never noticed, and I needed a little help to realize it was still there. But you’re right.” The smile that was starting flickered a little bigger. Twice in five minutes he'd said that. Probably a record, “I didn’t fail her. The world did. She’d want me to go on trying to fix the world, not let myself get just as broken. She wouldn’t want me to let it stop me from living my life, and going for the things I want in it.”

Head tilting to the side, toward his palm, Bobbi let out a long breath of her own, reaching up to to curl the fingers of one hand over his arm, sliding her hand with a light caress up to his wrist. The world had failed him, too, and she wished she could fix that, for his sake. "We've lost a hell of a lot of people, Clint." All of them had. If she could've brought any of them back just by not letting go of that, she'd have done it. Life didn't work like that, though. Never had. Sometimes, like now, she'd have given almost anything if she could've accepted that for him. It had always been easier for her. "We have to keep going, finish this damned fight, so that means something."

For Kate. For Marc. For Bruce. For all of them. Dying didn't scare her, she'd nearly done that more than once and always for a damned good reason. She'd do it again, if it came to that. Both of them would, though the idea of a life without Clint scared her more than anything else she'd ever faced or could ever think of.

"Then keep on making it mean something by having a life of our own again," Bobbi added, eyes on his that were so nearly the same color blue as her own, "You're damned right Kate would want that. I want that." With him, because he was the only one she ever had wanted it with. "We've earned it, Clint. Haven't we?"

Hadn't they? That life they used to talk about that they never quite got a chance to get to. That they'd put on hold almost five years ago. Hadn't they all damned well earned that?
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Sitting down was better. Clint had been starting to feel like an idiot standing there, trying to figure out what to say. He had to say something, didn't he? This wasn't going to just fix itself. It never did. Clint and Bobbi had both come to accept a long time ago that they had to put work into these things, but how were they supposed to start if he wasn't even sure, except in the vaguest possible sense, what they were even working towards?

Now he was sitting down, and he still had no idea what to say. Not when he couldn't even figure out what else was upsetting Bobbi. That look. What had that look meant? All he knew for sure was that something he'd said had set it off, but thinking about it was just sending his mind running around in circles and making him want to pull his hair out all over again.

How did everyone else make this seem so easy?

Kate, he could talk about a little more easily. He understood now that he hadn't let that go. Bobbi was right. He knew he was just hurting himself. And he knew exactly what Kate would say about it, too. She'd never shied away from yelling at him or telling him how much of an idiot he was, and god, did he miss that too.

He could at least apologize to Bobbi. That might be a good start, he hoped. He couldn't hold on to Kate's death like this. Blaming himself for it. Letting it stand between him and having a life. Especially a life with Bobbi. How much had they both missed out on because of that? No, that had to stop, and he'd go on doing everything he could to make the world better, to fight the cancer that was trying to tear it apart. If there was anything he could really say had failed Kate, it was that.

Bobbi tilted her face into the palm he'd placed on her cheek and she gusted a long breath. She lifted a hand and curled her fingers around his arm, drawing it up to his wrist in a gentle caress. "We've lost a hell of a lot of people, Clint."

More than he could count, and they might still lose more. They'd all fought hard over these years. Staying one step ahead of Tony and Carol and Hank. And they'd had more than there share of luck. But they were few. So many had been taken away. For all he knew he could be the next to go, and he'd accepted that years ago, too. He and Bobbi both, though God, he couldn't imagine trying to go on without her. It just wouldn't happen in his mind or in his heart. That would be too much for him to bear.

"We have to keep going, finish this damned fight, so that means something."

Clint looked up at her deep blue eyes and gave her a slow, serious nod. "It'll always mean something," he said with gentle conviction. "No matter what." He knew what she meant, but that didn't change what he meant. They were standing for something worthwhile. It was just a matter of whether that would endure.

"Then keep on making it mean something by having a life of our own again," she said, looking right back at him. "You're damned right Kate would want that. I want that. We've earned it, Clint. Haven't we?"

Earned it? After all these years when they could have kept it if they'd chosen to. They'd willingly put it on hold and never complained once. Hell yes, they'd earned that life and then some. "Bobbi-bird, if anyone thinks we haven't," he said, settling his hand on her shoulder, "well, I say 'nuts' to them. You're what keeps me going, whether it's the fight or anything else. And..."

He faltered then, lowered his head and drew in a long breath. God, what was he even doing. Lifting his eyes back to hers he said, "All this kind of scares me, Mock, but it's not what you think." And wasn't that just asking for trouble. Especially since that wasn't necessarily a good thing. Too close to what they'd just been talking about. "It's important and I don't want to just stumble into it," he explained, which was part of it, and might be the one thing he could say that wouldn't get him socked in the shoulder.

"But the thing is, Babe," he continued, giving her shoulder a little squeeze. "Maybe I'm crazy, but the really big thing about all this, is that right now, I can't think of anything I want more."

The more he thought about it, the less he could deny it. If Bobbi wasn't ready, well, he'd understand, but that was part of having that life, too, wasn't it?
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Kate was gone. They couldn't change that. No matter how much they wanted to, it was over and done. What the hell would they gain by never letting that go? Never letting it settle into the past, where it had to be, just like they'd had to do with all the others?

And they'd lost a lot of others. A hell of a lot of people. By the time tomorrow was over, maybe they'd lose more. Maybe her or Clint or Jen or Simon or Greer. The thought was like a punch to the solar plexus as Bobbi drew her fingers along his arm, cheek resting against his palm. Life without Clint, without him in her world, it was something she didn't want to imagine. It made her heart ache.

It would be like losing a piece of her soul.

They didn't have any control over that, though. They'd have to take what came and they both knew that, but they also had to keep going, finish this so that everything before it, all the loss and death, wouldn't be for nothing.

Clint nodded, slow and grave, eyes full of the type of conviction he'd carried with him since she'd first met him. "It'll always mean something," he replied with a surety she was glad this whole damned mess hadn't been able to take away from him when it'd already taken so much from all of them. "No matter what."

No matter what. That was her Hawk. Some of the glitter might've rubbed off that idealism over the years, but it was still there. At the core of who he was. She wouldn't have it any other way.

It wasn't just now, though, and maybe that's what she was trying to get to. And failing like usual when it came to things like this. The hard things. The things that mattered and the things that hurt and the things that made her feel too exposed. God, but this made her feel that way.

Maybe what it came down to, though,was that they had to keep on making all of it matter. By having a life of their own again that was something besides just fighting to stay alive from one day to the next. From trying to keep everything from completely falling apart, from teetering off that precarious edge it was balanced on. Kate would want that. She sure as hell wouldn't want to be the reason it didn't happen. Hell, she wanted that, maybe more than she'd ever let herself realize before today.

Five years of putting it all on hold. Of not having a choice. Not one they could live with, anyway. They'd earned a life of their own again. Hadn't they?

Hadn't they earned that?

"Bobbi-bird, if anyone thinks we haven't," he said, settling his hand on her shoulder, "well, I say 'nuts' to them. You're what keeps me going, whether it's the fight or anything else. And..." And? And what?

Giving him an expectant look that was turning toward a confused one as the smile that'd been forming on her face faltered in it's own right, Bobbi's brow knit slightly and her brain kicked back into gear. Whirling around and trying to figure out how the hell to interpret this edge he'd left her hanging on suddenly as he dropped his head and pulled in a breath.

What did that mean? What the hell just happened here? God, she was going to lose her mind. They were never going to finish this conversation - or even have this conversation - and she was going to lose her mind.

"All this kind of scares me, Mock, but it's not what you think." It wasn't what she thought? What did he think she was thinking? What was he thinking? About Kate? That having a life again scared him? Having a life with her scared him? She scared him? (That, at least, might make some sense) What the hell? "It's important and I don't want to just stumble into it," he explained only without any explaining actually happening and the frown on her face etched a little deeper.

"What-" she started, for lack of anything else to do other than chase the tails of her own confused thoughts around in her head again like greyhounds chasing a rabbit around a track. Part of her wanted to hug him, just for that look in his eyes. The other part wanted to shake him because she couldn't figure out what they hell they were talking about now, exactly.

But Clint was on a roll. On a roll and thinking and she wasn't sure if that was good or bad, since right now it was just confusing, at least for her. "But the thing is, Babe," he continued, giving her shoulder a little squeeze. "Maybe I'm crazy, but the really big thing about all this, is that right now, I can't think of anything I want more."

For a couple of seconds she waited to see if there was anything after that. Nope. And her brain was still a whirling dervish of possibilities and outright guesses of what it was, exactly, Clint really wanted. Or didn't want. Or was scared of.

Jesus.

"Okay," she agreed slowly, taking a deep breath of her own and still torn a little between hugging him or choking him or maybe just throwing him down on the bed so they didn't have to keep doing this. A temporary solution, but it'd keep them busy for at least a while, "want to tell me what that is, Clint?" Bobbi asked in semi-desperation. "What do you want, exactly?"

So she didn't resort to pulling her own hair out, or actually strangling him (since she did love him and knew she'd regret it later) Mockingbird stood up and threw her hands up in exasperation. Which bore absolutely no resemblance to flailing. At all.

"You want our life back, but you're scared of it? Or me? Or-I don't know!" Alright, lowering the voice now, no point sharing this with the whole helicarrier level. "I love you," she insisted, still probably a little too loudly, but the volume control was apparently broken right now, " I want our life. Together. The one we were supposed to have five years ago!" The house, a damned dog if Clint wanted one. Kids. God she wanted kids, how had she not noticed that before today? "You're the love of my life, you idiot," Bobbi added, eyes narrowed and voice filled with frustration and still too loud, but screw it, "and I have no idea if we're even having the same conversation!"
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Was there even a doubt?

Bobbi shouldn't have to ask if they'd earned that life, the one they'd pictured in smiles and laughter when they got hitched in Vegas, the one they'd fiercely held on to when they'd worked so hard to patch things up between them. As far as Clint was concerned they'd earned it back then, and there wasn't a chance in Hell that giving themselves to this fight had done anything to lessen that.

She was his rock, The presence that kept him grounded, the reason he'd held himself together all these years. But first a foremost she was his wife, the woman he loved, and he'd always put that, and her ahead of anything else. He never wanted Bobbi to have to feel like they were missing out, that they didn't deserve to have it in the first place, and especially not because of the choices they've made.

That much, at least was easy to say. Managing the rest started giving him problems right from the first damn word. It already had Bobbi giving him an odd, conflicted look. God, he needed to figure this out. To explain what he meant, because sure, he was scared. He'd stumbled on that back in Utah and everyone had gotten a front row seat to it. But it wasn't what Bobbi thought.

Which was kind of hard to prove, since he had no clue what she was thinking, but how could anything putting that look on her face be right? She knew as well as he did how huge a mistake it would be to treat that sort of thing lightly, what it would mean in the face of what they were doing. It was too big, too important for him to be his usual cavalier self.

All that did was make Bobbi frown more. "What-" she managed to say before Clint rolled right over her. He had to get this out somehow or he'd lose his nerve, or fumble the explanation even worse. She needed to know that despite how much it scared him, despite the fact that he'd been holding on to Kate's death without even realizing it, the truth was he wanted this more than anything else he could possibly think of.

She was the love of his life, but wasn't there room to add more to that? For both of them? Maybe he was crazy to dump this on Bobbi so suddenly, especially when he was still getting used to it himself. Hell of a time for him to get that kick in the pants to realize how he really felt. Maybe she wasn't ready. It wouldn't surprise him. But if they didn't talk about it, they'd never get on the same page.

Right now, though, he was getting a little worried that they weren't even on the same chapter. Bobbi wasn't saying anything. That was never a good sign. Clint's hands went back to the pants on his lap, kneading them nervously as his mind started running over everything he'd said and everything she might say, moving in a mad spiral.

"Okay," she finally said, taking in a deep breath like she was getting ready to jump, but God only knew in which direction. "want to tell me what that is, Clint? What do you want, exactly?"

Clint's brows knit together in confusion as he regarded Bobbi. "I- I just said." Hadn't he?

Apparently not, because a second later, Bobbi threw her hands into the air. It was a display of utter, flailing exasperation that Clint had seen before. Fairly often. Not that calling attention to it right now was necessarily a good idea. Still, what had he done now? Clint raised a warding hand but said nothing. It wouldn't do any good right now anyway.

"You want our life back, but you're scared of it? Or me? Or-I don't know!" She must have realized her volume was rising, because she brought it back down some. Some. Not all. "I love you," she said. A bit intense, and if she kept reversing directions on him like this he was going to start feeling like Clint the human pinball. "I want our life. Together. The one we were supposed to have five years ago!"

Which was what exactly? Clint's lips drew in as he felt his own frustration rising. Was she saying she did regret joining the Resistance? That was impossible. He'd have noticed that at least. So what was she talking about, and why wasn't she just saying it? She fixed him with a narrow gaze, voice now back to full volume. Because the whole deck had to hear about this. Yeah. "You're the love of my life, you idiot, and I have no idea if we're even having the same conversation!"

That much they could agree on at least. Clint lifted a clawed hand to his face, squeezing his eyes shut in exasperation. "What do I want?" he asked in a low breath. He dropped the hand back to his lap and met her eyes with narrowed slits of his own. "What do you think I want, Bird-brain? I want all of it!" He flung his own arms up, because why not? If she could do it so could he.

"I want a house with a white picket fence and a big back yard with a pool where we can have neighborhood barbeques. I want a yellow dog that brings me the paper in the morning and whimpers when we don't let it sleep on the bed with us." His voice climbed steadily, frustration reaching its limit. Leaning toward her, he held out his arms like he was trying to summon down lightning from the heavens.

"I want kids, alright?" he shouted, loud enough to nearly echo through the room. "Two or three of them. I think it'd be great to have a bunch of little Bobbis running around, getting into trouble and begging me to read stories when they go to bed. I want to get to know them and for us to love them together." He gave his head a rough shake and drew in a sharp breath. He wanted to hug her, but she was driving him out of his mind right now. "How many ways do I have to say it, Babe? Don't you want kids?"
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Oh god. This should be easier. Why the hell wasn't this easier?

Why she kept expecting it to be, Bobbi couldn't say for sure. Maybe she figured all the practice would eventually take. Maybe it was wishful thinking. Maybe she was just delusional.

Whatever it was, every time she somehow expected talking to Clint to get easier. They'd been married for years, for god's sake. Every single time, it never did.

Should've gone with option C: throw him on the bed and then they could both stop talking. Or trying to.

That idea was completely out the window, now, since she'd gone with a choice that hadn't even been on the list. Get so frustrated and confused that she finally threw up her hands and started...

Well, started yelling, okay? She was officially yelling and there didn't seem to be a damned thing she could do about it as she tried to figure out what the hell they were actually talking about! What was it Clint wanted, exactly? Because she couldn't seem to figure it out from any of that, not matter how hard she tried.

"I- I just said." He said, looking as damned confused as she felt, and that didn't bode well. And there he went, doing that nervous wringing thing with his jeans.

Another time, that might've stopped her, or at least slowed her down. Bobbi knew it should've then, but she felt like a tightly wound and tangled ball of frustration and it had her literally throwing up her hands. Clint raised a hand, to what? Hold her off? Settle her down?

Fat chance.

Maybe she hadn't meant to be that loud, maybe she hadn't meant to lose her temper, but what the hell was she supposed to think of all that? He was scared? Of her? Of life after this? Of all those memories of Kate? (God, she still didn't know how she could've missed that all this time.) What??

She'd tried to figure it out for herself but ended up just chasing her own damned tail and she hated that. He knew she hated that. Hated the uncertainty and...and...god!

Clint was the love of her life. Once, she'd tried living without it and it wasn't something she ever wanted to have to do again, even if she knew there were no guarantees. Not for them or anybody else. But she wanted that life. Their life. The one they'd almost had together before all this had forced them to put it on hold five damned years ago.

Maybe she hadn't realized until today just how much she wanted it. Maybe she couldn't. What damned good would it have done? It didn't change the fact that she did and now she wasn't even sure if they were talking about anything even close to the same thing and it was tying her up in knots she couldn't articulate and had never been able to. Not even for Hawk.

For him, she did try. She always had, but trying it now defeated her. Clogging in her throat and chest until all she could do was yell and not care that she was yelling.

And glaring, for no damned reason other than she needed to glare at something, as Clint's hand, fingers splayed, moved to cover his face, eyes squeezing closed like his own head might explode. Great. That made two of them. "What do I want?" he asked in a low breath. He dropped the hand back to his lap and met her eyes with narrowed slits of his own. "What do you think I want, Bird-brain? I want all of it!"

"All of what?" Bobbi demanded, still glaring right back. Because he was glaring now, too, and flinging his own arms around. Oh, no. He did not get to horn in on her frustration here. That was not how this was going to work.

"I want a house with a white picket fence and a big back yard with a pool where we can have neighborhood barbeques. I want a yellow dog that brings me the paper in the morning and whimpers when we don't let it sleep on the bed with us." He leaned in and she crossed her arms, setting her jaw as he raised his arms. Maybe in some sort of supplication, or in an effort not to strangle her. Or at least try.

She'd kicked his ass before, she could do it again, room be damned. It was the hellicarrier. If they broke this room, there were plenty more.

"Fine!" she snapped, because at least that made sense. Finally. He wanted a house, they'd get a damned house. And a damned dog. Yellow, black, green, she didn't give a crap. But if he thought he-

"I want kids, alright?" he shouted, loud enough to nearly echo through the room. Well, hell, why didn't he just tell the rest of the helicarrier? She was sure somebody on the farther decks might've missed that. "Two or three of them. I think it'd be great to have a bunch of little Bobbis running around, getting into trouble and begging me to read stories when they go to bed. I want to get to know them and for us to love them together." He gave his head a rough shake and drew in a sharp breath. He wanted to hug her, but she was driving him out of his mind right now. "How many ways do I have to say it, Babe? Don't you want kids?"

If she could've narrowed her eyes. she would've, but they seemed to have hit some sort of hard limit, so Bobbi settled for planting her fists on her hips, instead. "What? Of course I want kids! What the hell do you think I've been trying to tell you?" Jesus. How the hell did a guy who was so smart most of the time get this dense?

"And what the hell's wrong with boys? You don't get to decide things like that all on your own, you know," Mockingbird insisted, raising one hand to poke him in that broad chest with her index finger. Just for a little added punctuation. "Jerkface," she added sullenly and just for good measure.

Sure, she loved him to death. He was her whole damned world, the only man she'd ever seen herself having a forever with, or wanted one with. The only one she'd want as the father of her kids. But when it fit, it fit.
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Hawkeye
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I retire for what, like, five minutes and it all goes to shit.
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Now they were yelling at each other. Great. Or they were going to be yelling at each other, since Clint hadn't quite started yet, but he was getting there. Bobbi didn't get to shout and flail her arms all over the place without letting him join the party.

Everything. That's what he wanted. After putting it off for five years, why shouldn't they go for the complete package?

The answer wasn't good enough, apparently. Clint was batting a thousand today in the Communication Breakdown World Series. His wife glared at him like she was trying to keep the glares all to herself, which was definitely not happening. She did not hold the monopoly on glares. "All of what?" she shot back, because apparently he still wasn't being clear enough to satisfy her.

Argh! There were people out there who made this look simple, and right now Clint hated every single one of then. Maybe he and Bobbi really were having completely separate conversations. They were practically experts in that. Trying to figure that out was just going to have Clint chasing his tail all over again, though, and he might literally explode, so for now he was just going to pretend he hadn't had that thought.

If he had to spell it out for her, then fine, he'd be freaking alphabet soup for her. He wanted a house and a dog, something right out of a Norman Rockwell piece, and that was just for starters. Bobbi crossed her arms and thrust her jaw out at him like she was daring him to do more than throw his arms up at her For a moment her almost thought she was about to decide she'd rather go a few rounds than let him keep ranting at her. Maybe she was right, for that matter. They could tear the room apart while she kicked his ass. It sounded better then running around in circles the way they had been.

Instead of throwing a punch, she just said, "Fine!" He answered back just as quickly with a "Fine!" of his own, but he wasn't done. If she thought that was all there was to it, she couldn't be more wrong. He also wanted kids. Couldn't keep his voice down, what did it matter if the whole damn helicarrier and half the people down in the strip club heard. At least he'd finally said it.

Kids, okay? He'd say it again if he had to, as many times as it took even though this whole thing was driving him crazy. He could almost see it. A whole pack of minature Bobbis sounded like Heaven to him. She was the love of his life and he just knew she'd be an amazing mom. God, how could it have taken him this long to realize how much he wanted that? Didn't she want that too?

Bobbi's eyes were nothing but thin slits, her expression hard as granite. She unfolded her arms and set tight fists against her bare hips. "What? Of course I want kids! What the hell do you think I've been trying to tell you?"

Was she kidding him, now? Clint worked his jaw back and forth for a second, nostrils flaring as he met her glare, unflinching. "How the heck am I supposed to know?" he asked. Last time he looked, he was pretty sure he was the one trying to say something.

"And what the hell's wrong with boys? You don't get to decide things like that all on your own, you know," Mock added, and jabbed him in the chest with one finger. Now where had that come from? Then, in a lower, more sullen voice, she said, "Jerkface," which probably meant she was done yelling, at least.

Clint shook his head in mild bafflement. "Wha- Who said anything was wrong with boys?" he asked. He was pretty sure there was something he ought to say about her accusation about his involvement in how that turned out, but whatever, she was the biologist.

"You want boys?" he asked, fingers digging into the pants on his lap. "Fine!" He flung his arms back into the air in frustration, taking his pants with them. The pants sailed for the ceiling, bounced off of it and dropped onto the carpet somewhere to the side with a faint thump. His arms mad a thump of their own as he brought them back to his sides. "Lets have boys. We can pick out how many of each right now if you want." And why not hair color and favorite foods while they were at it? He was game for whatever.

"I love you, Birdie, and I'm gonna love anything you make in there." He reached forward with one hand and gave her a gently poke just below the bellybutton. It was completely covered by his shirt and god, she always looked hot as hell in his shirts, but he wasn't going to get distracted. They were still having a fight, here.
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Mockingbird
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What? What the hell? What did he mean 'didn't she want kids'? Of course she wanted kids! Was he deaf again or what? That's exactly what she'd just been trying to tell him!

Only he obviously hadn't been listening and he could make that annoyed, what the hell are you talking about face all he wanted. Wouldn't change the fact that he obviously wasn't listening to a word she said.

"How the heck am I supposed to know?" he asked and see! Not listening! Bobbi was ready to throw up her hands again and just give the hell up. Or smack him. Or maybe first one and then the other.

"Because I just told you," Mockingbird shot back, having reached the hard limit of her glaring ability, but that didn't stop her all the same. While they were on the subject, what the hell was all this stuff about girls? Was there something wrong with boys?

Because if Hawk thought he was just going to unilaterally decide all this on his own, he'd better think again. This was a marriage, not a dictatorship and she punctuated that with the poking of one index finger at that bare, broad chest of his. And if he thought that was going to distract her, well he had another think coming.

Jerkface.

"Wha- Who said anything was wrong with boys?" he asked shaking his head like he had no idea what she was talking about again. Ha! Not buying that, either.

"You just said girls!" Bobbi pointed out, since he had. Wasn't he even paying attention to what he was saying now, either? God. Men. Especially this man.

"You want boys?" he asked, fingers digging into the pants on his lap. "Fine!" He flung his arms back into the air in frustration, taking his pants with them. Great. Now he was bouncing his pants off the ceiling. That was helpful. And mature. Really mature. Especially with the added arm flailing and Bobbi crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes at him again. "Lets have boys. We can pick out how many of each right now if you want."

What the hell was he talking about? That's not how it worked. She didn't even need that degree in biology to know that.

"That doesn't even make any sense," she pointed out, frustration growing and jaw set stubbornly. She was trying to be serious here, talk about their future, and he was talking nonsense. "Be serious, Clint."

Probably too much to ask for, but jesus. Boys. Girls. Some of each, what the hell did it matter if they ended up strangling each other before they finished this conversation? And that was looking more and more like a possibility.

"I love you, Birdie, and I'm gonna love anything you make in there." Then he was poking her in the stomach like she was the damned Pillsbury Doughboy and Bobbi did throw up her hands again with a growl of pure frustration. She loved him to death and beyond, but that hadn't ever kept her from smacking him over the head and it wouldn't now.

"Oh my god, Hawk, you make me sound like an EZ Bake Oven." Seriously, what the hell? "We're talking about kids, here, not blueberry muffins!" God, they were talking about kids weren't they? Kids and a future after tomorrow, after all this time, and some kind of damned dog and suddenly Bobbi decided she needed to sit down again.

Turning, she dropped down onto the edge of the bed, was probably lucky she didn't miss it, and turned toward Clint again. Hoping she didn't look as stunned as she suddenly felt. He'd be an amazing dad, she'd always known that. Whether he realized it or not, it was something she'd never doubted. Probably amazing enough to make up for her probably total lack of having the first clue what the hell to do with a kid, but that didn't change how much she wanted that. All of it. With him.

"We are, aren't we?" Bobbi asked aloud, this time in a volume closer to normal, probably because she still felt a little like someone'd smacked her in the back of the head with her own bo staff. "Talking about kids?" she clarified, because god knew it never hurt for one've them to do that. "And maybe having one've our stupidest arguments ever."

Which would be a pretty damned big achievement, considering some've the things they'd managed to fight about in the years they'd known each other.
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