Dear Agony

Chapter 8: Blackbird

Natasha woke up particularly late that morning, her head still pounding from getting sick on the amount of alcohol she consumed, but her body surprisingly felt slightly less tired than it had in days. Sunlight peeked through the small cracks in her blinds, as she sat herself up. Even in the mostly dark room, she could see that the side of the bed next to her was still made, because she stuck to sleeping only on her side of the bed. She wasn't used to there being a vacant space next to her, and she wasn't sure how long it would take her to realize no one slept beside her anymore.

She actually appreciated the cool temperature of the apartment, as she made her way out of bed and into the kitchen, pulling out a mug to make tea. Opening one curtain to let some light into the small apartment, she noticed Lucky laying on the floor by the front door. Biting her lip, she managed to locate the dog food, and she gently placed a tin bowl of water and food by where the golden dog laid.

"Eat up now Luck, can't have you starving yourself," she said under her breath, as she returned to the kitchen. Though ironically, she hadn't eaten anything in the past two days she had been home.

Empty glasses and bottles from the night before still covered the counter, which suddenly made Natasha feel a wave of nausea. Sliding all of it into the garbage, she grasped her mug of tea, and took small sips as she watched Lucky fail to be interested in his food. For once she felt some understanding in the dog's emotions.

Natasha realized that looking at the boxes and trunks of Clint's belongings, were not going to make her feel any better. So while she didn't want to, she forced herself to sit down and unpack everything. She ran her fingers over his last name, Barton, which was engraved in silver on his large black SHIELD trunk. She had one just like this, only it remained on the one remaining SHIELD helicarrier that Fury had, and practically used as a SHIELD base. Opening it, she found mostly what she had expected: several of Clint's combat uniforms, four different bows, several cases of assorted arrows, a variety of other small hand weapons, his technology, and other small items essential to his line of work. The hardest thing for Natasha was probably the fact that in the trunk was his combat suit he wore on his last mission. It was washed clean of blood for the most part, and where bullet holes had ripped the leather, there were stitches. But that didn't make Natasha feel any better as she held the suit.

By the time she emptied it all, she was overwhelmed with what to do with everything. She eventually put everything back into the black trunk, and would store it away in the room that was technically his bedroom before he and Natasha started dating and sharing a room. However she kept his SHIELD badge, his first model of bow he used during his work in SHEILD, the bow he used on the mission he met her, and the various pictures he kept in his SHEILD locker or even uniforms, and put them in the dark wood chest at the end of her bed.

The lid of the trunk felt heavier than it ever had as she lifted it. Maybe it was because of her injured hand, or maybe it was just the weight of everything catching up to Natasha. Natasha kneeled on the soft carpet as she tried to make room for some of Clint's more important possessions in her chest. This was the same chest that stored her KGB files, her Red Room files. However it also held objects that carried more meaningful significance in her life as an Avenger, and wife to Clint.

Just as she thought she found room to place the folded American flag, given to her at Clint's funeral, she caught glimpse of the an effervescent material of an ivory dress, and instantly her thoughts began to wander back to the last time she wore that dress. Back to memories that were painful to think about, but she longed to hold onto them in great detail, hoping to never forget one part of them. After all, with Clint gone, all she had were memories. And so her thoughts traveled back to a summer night almost three years ago...

-

Inhaling and exhaling sharply the archer continued to mess with his black tie, which still wasn't straight enough for his standards. As he grew at least somewhat satisfied with his tie, the rush of the wind made him begin to worry about his hair. Steve could see the apparent worry in Clint's grey blue eyes, but only smiled to himself, finding it amusing this was the most nervous he had ever seen the usually rather calm archer.