No Tears | NR

Chapter 60

Avengers Compound, USA

After a tragedy such as the one that the world experienced a year ago, one that impacted everyone everywhere, life just seemed to stop. Streets were empty and an unnatural, almost eerie silence made it seem like all people were extinct. In many places, that might as well have been the case. People were nothing more than surviving.

Yara could relate. Surviving was exactly what she had spent most of her life doing. But not anymore. Or at least it wasn't the only thing she was doing anymore. Strangely enough, despite the circumstances, for the first time in a long time, she felt alive. That ecstasy, although freeing, was short-lived. Soon enough, the rest of the world caught up to her once again, and that feeling of being alive faded, leaving all but a distant memory of what was once there.

Not much had changed between Yara and Natasha. They continued carrying on with their lives, more or less, and desperately looked for things to do in order to take their minds off of...everything, really.

Natasha was coordinating various missions and projects from the compound while feverishly looking for a way to fix everything. Yara helped sometimes but after almost two years of research, they were just as clueless and out of ideas as they were in the beginning. Everyone who was left was losing hope, as far as Yara could tell, and she couldn't help but feel the same way. Natasha was the only one who still seemed to firmly believe that there was a way to fix everything. Yara hoped that she was right even if she couldn't see it herself.

There wasn't much for her to do at the compound other than work out so she found herself a job. She needed a way to pass time and programming seemed like as good an activity as any plus she got paid decently for it. Due to the events almost two years ago in Wakanda, remote work had become more popular. Yara spent hours every day in front of a screen typing away. Soon, her back began to cramp up from sitting in a chair for too long and headaches had become a consistent part of her life.

Natasha asked her to slow down at one point when Yara worked throughout a full day and night until early into the next morning when the other woman found her sitting at her desk. Yara, of course, didn't listen and Natasha didn't make any more comments about it for a while. How could she when she was no better?

So their routines of overworking themselves continued. Some days, Natasha would find Yara passed out in her chair with her head on the keyboard. She would carefully pick the brunette up and carry her up to her room. Other times, it would be the other way around and Yara would be the one taking care of Natasha.

This went on for months without either one of them saying anything about it. However, it was one of those moments, when Natasha picked up Yara to carry her to her bed that she noticed how light the woman had become. That was what finally got her to speak to Yara about it.

Yara came shuffling into the kitchen where Natasha had been waiting. She headed straight for the coffee machine and barely acknowledged the other woman with a brief nod of her head. She stifled a yawn and prepared coffee while Natasha watched her. Yara could feel her eyes on her but chose to ignore them for the time being. She knew that Natasha wanted something from her. Otherwise, she wouldn't be here watching her make coffee.

Despite Yara's best attempts, she couldn't stop herself from spinning around and almost yelling, "What?" In retrospect, she blamed her tiredness and lack of energy, but at that moment, she couldn't think straight and was in a bad mood. Everything irritated her and she lacked any self-control.

Natasha hadn't quite expected to be yelled at but also wasn't exactly surprised. She knew that there was no point in talking to Yara when she was in a mood like this. However, this seemed to be the only mood she was ever in recently and there was no better time than the present, she decided.