Almost Dusk {A Black Widow Story}

CHAPTER THREE

(Natasha's Perspective)

I look into her eyes. Their piercing gaze stares back at me with a certain vacancy behind them, as if their sight is clouded by other images.

There is a sickening dread in those eyes, a visual reminder that this place is part of her. A part that won't ever completely disappear, no matter how hard one tries to erase the past.

I step away from the mirror.

The entire room is mirrored, providing a sense of being surrounded on all sides. The one barre that cuts through the mirror wraps itself around the two sides of the room, leaving the front and back mirrors bare.

My fingers tingle as I rest both palms on the edge of the barre, taking in my reflection.

It's been a long time since I stepped back into a ballet studio. Longer still since I've had the familiar rushes of adrenaline surge through my body the way they do when preparing for a routine.

Even highly dangerous espionage doesn't provide the same kind of thrill that ballet does. The precision, the discipline; it's unlike anything else I have ever encountered.

Simply standing in this room brings up the scars of my past like a blanket thrown over my head.

I feel like I could suffocate, but only on the inside. On the outside I'm stone cold, unfeeling and unfazed by what is before my eyes. But only deep down inside would I admit any sort of discomfort brewing.

This is a mission. I'm here to do my job.

I play these thoughts on a loop in my brain, reassuring my ever-growing desire to leave running from this awful place.

I study myself carefully in the mirror as I retreat from the room, not even bothering to turn off the lights or shut the door. I just kept moving.

Once I'm out of the studio my thoughts clear as if a trance has been broken.

My guard is up, but the halls remain empty and silent.

There are more of the same doors this way, their numbers the only thing distinguishing one room from the next.

A lot of this is familiar, but I've tried so desperately to repress the images from my time here that it's almost like I'm rediscovering the place all over again.

I turn another corner that feels longer than the others. There are no doors along this way which is oddly comforting as the pull of the ballet studios disappears entirely, but at the same time it's menacing; like something is trying not to be found.

I keep walking.

Reaching the end of the hall there is only one way to move. Left.

Turning the corner stirred something inside of me, some instinctual gut-feeling deep inside of me surfacing as I find myself along another hallway, this one much shorter.

There are several doors down this way, but much more spread apart compared to the previous rooms.

I slow my pace and edge forward as if some magnetic pulse is drawing me on.

A feeling rushes over me, a sense of familiarity.

And suddenly I'm standing at a door, the fifth door down the hall. I don't know what made me stop but I know I have to follow my instincts.

I twist the handle and find it unlatches with a swift click.

The door swings all the way open, but I can't bring myself to enter.