Heroes

Part of the Journey is the End

Natasha stood in front of her floor length mirror as tired eyes stared back at her. She ran her hand down the lace of her knee-length black dress and brushed a stray hair behind her ear. How was she supposed to get through today...how were any of them supposed to get through today?

"Mommy?" A small voice called and Natasha turned towards the door and saw her daughter standing there.
Maria was dressed in a simple black dress with a white collar and a white sash wrapped around her waist. The young girl was fiddling with the hem of her skirt, unsure of how to process today, and Natasha did not blame her since she was only six years old.

Natasha bent down and held her arms open, letting the young girl rush into them. Raising her hands, she brushed her daughter's auburn hair behind her ears.

"What's up, my little mermaid?" Natasha asked, trying to keep the quiver out of her voice.

"Help." Her daughter simply said and held out a hair tie.

Natasha smiled softly and took the tie as Maria sat in front of her mother. Being a spy for over half her life, it did not take long for Natasha to braid her daughter's hair. But even though she finished her task, Natasha kept running her hand up and down her daughter's back, before bringing the young girl into a hug. Natasha gave her daughter credit, for only being six, she seemed to understand the weight of the situation.

Mother and daughter stayed like that until a knock at the door caused Natasha to look up. Clint stood there, dressed in a suit and a small smile on his face.

"Hey, Maria, why don't you go find your brother?" Clint suggested. "I gotta talk to your mom for a sec."

"Okay." Maria agreed and got up, running a small hand down the length of her braid. "Thank you, mommy."

"You're welcome." Natasha told her softly and watched with a sad smile on her face as Maria ran off in search of Steven.

"How are you holding up?" Clint asked as he offered her his hand.

"About as good as expected." Natasha answered as she accepted his hand. "How long do we got until we need to be at the cemetery?"

"About 30 minutes." Clint replied, looking at his watch, before eyeing his best friend nervously. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"How's Wanda?" Natasha asked instead and Clint let out a small sigh but wrapped an arm around her waist, allowing her to lean back into him.

"She's been better." Clint answered. "She still feels extremely guilty for what happened."

"Why?" Natasha asked, craning her neck to look at Clint. "You know how stubborn he was, there was no way to talk him out of it once he knew what he had to do."

"And yet, he was always teaching us how to be less stubborn." A voice called from the doorway.

Natasha and Clint exchanged a look at this, but knew it was the truth. Perhaps that was why all of them got along so well, because of how much they refused to budge. Natasha left her best friend's embrace and walked over to her husband. There was a part of his eyes that showed he felt just as guilty for what had happened two weeks ago as Wanda did.

"Are you okay?" Natasha asked Tony.

"I just wish there was some way...that I could let him know. That we won." Tony looked into her green eyes, tears lining the bottom of his. "We did it."

"He knows." Natasha told him. "As does Vision, and Pietro, and Phil, and Rhodey, and all the other people we have lost along the way."

Tony was silent for a moment before he asked the question Clint had been trying to ask her right before he came in.