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"Jesus, fine. He can be as mad about you about whatever shit he's decided to blame you for this time so long as it makes him happy."

Clint has stopped being mad at Tony for the things that happen, the sides that got chosen. It was hard to hold that grudge when incarceration turned into house arrest and a pretty cozy retirement.

He quirks a very light smile, at... all of that, actually. It's a little amused, but it's more affectionate than anything.

"You're a good guy." He means that with every earnest fiber of his being. "So is Tony. Some of what he blames me for is fair, some isn't, and none of it matters. You gonna be staying in for the next hour or two?"

He nearly chokes at being called a good guy. In that voice Steve gets when he means what he says, when he's being very deliberate about saying what he's saying, how he's saying, and who he's saying it to. His shoulders draw up, then back down again when the pull aches more than he'd like. He has to let lunch sit for a minute so he can get the appetite that so swiftly left him back.

Remember to breathe.

"Yeah." To answer the question while he stares at the countertop for a few seconds longer before making himself take another bite.

It doesn't take any kind of genius to see that tension or know why it's there. He isn't going to apologize for it, though. No matter how uncomfortable it is - to hear, or be reminded of it, or even just having somebody believing it - Steve hadn't been lying and he's not sorry he said it.

"Okay. I'm gonna see what I can do about shutting my brain off for a while, without drawing any attention to myself. Think about maybe leaving a note if you decide you can't stay put. Just so I know if you're coming back."

Worried about Clint bolting, still? A little. Still pulling on his shoes and grabbing his hat and sunglasses, though.

"You think I'm gonna leave you high and dry now, after all this? Nah, you're in it for the rest of this trip." Anything after is, of course, a mystery left up in the air. But running now wouldn't do much good. Steve knows the target, and he knows Clint's never been one to abandon a mission. He wouldn't go far.

"I'll be here."

Anything's possible. "All right. I'll handle my end of the deal and bring back dinner." Not that there's not some food still there.

He doesn't put any pressure behind it but puts a hand on Clint's bicep before sliding his glasses firmly on his face and heading out.

He'll be back - with food he picked up from a place down the street, that's still hot - at exactly the two hour mark. What did he do those two hours? Walk. Nothing more exciting or complicated than unobtrusive but constant motion at a reasonable pace.

Because fuck attention. Not this close to Clint's temporary place and plan going live.

Steve's still about the casual touching. The whole teddy bear thing didn't disperse that desire, apparently. Clint only looks at the hand, briefly, and not at Steve.

It feels like it means something, but he knows he's also being a (rightfully) paranoid fuck trying to find meaning in everything that might not have it. Stop. fucking. thinking about it.

Well, he did the cold to keep swelling down. But now it's time for hot to ease some of the stiffness. And a shower will get any of the rest of the blood, sweat, and dirt off. And it might distract him from Steve insisting on how good he is, distract him from brief touches that want to linger in his senses. Take in the sting of impact and the relief of warmth. And always remember to breathe.

He's shirtless again when Steve's back this time, apparently having said 'fuck it' to pulling a shirt back on. The deep, dark mottling of bruises are clear on display, but Clint's in the midst of doing some cleaning of his blade at the table. Making sure no dirt and dust and grime's in any of the mechanisms, making sure no blood is going to start crusting and rusting on the metal. He'll sharpen it and set himself in the right mindset before the mission, but this is simply weapon maintenance.

"Lemmie know if you need me to clear off the table."

Steve's look is what lingers this time, though at least it's mostly clinical and all about assessing those bruises. He's both satisfied by their presence and making damn sure nothing looks worse than he'd expect (or want) it to.

"Only if you need the room." He puts the bag on the counter, fishes out one of the take-out boxes and puts it off to the side of where Clint's working, then heads off into the bathroom to clean himself up some. Not a full shower, just washing his face and hands. Makes a mental note to shave when he does get that shower, and then heads back out.

Where he takes his food and just sits down on the floor. It's comfortable enough and isn't in Clint's way. "You get most of what you needed to do done while I was out?"

"Gonna do another good walk around, double check positions I scouted out before. Keep my ear to the ground in case of any last minute changes. But I can do that later." When it's darker, when it's more night, when it's more the conditions he's expecting.

He holds the blade up to the light, casting a keen eye over the edges. "How's it looking back there?" He could kind of make out some of the bruising, twisting over his shoulder to see in the mirror, but he trusts that if something looked worse, Steve would say something.

There's something about that blade that is still making Steve ever-so-slightly uneasy. It's not fear, or wariness, or even really emotional discomfort from Clint using it. Probably not the last anyway. Feels like something entirely in himself.

Since he can't explain it, he's going to keep ignoring it.

"Like I should've done a better job accounting for range of motion needed to use a sword," he admits, around bites of food. "But not bad enough for me to be worried about it, either."

"Glad you didn't have to pop anything out of a socket then or I'd really be in trouble. Only got so many throwing knives." He rolls his shoulders deliberately. It hurts like a bitch.

But nothing he's not expecting.

He runs a cloth one last time over the blade and, satisfied, slots it back into the handle-sheath.

"And using it one-handed is possible, sure, but you get less control and precision, easier to get unbalanced." He glances down at Steve as he starts to clean up, snorting a little. "You want a chair?"

"Nah. Now that I'm down here, it's just as easy to stay." And kind of give Clint some space, in direct contradiction to what he wants to do. "How much does it weigh?"

Maybe once he sees this fight, he'll be better equipped if this whole scenario plays out again. ...and he kind of expects it to, somehow.

"Extremely light. The samurai knew what they were about. Easy to draw one-handed, and if you were a little more uncouth, you used the sword in one hand and the sheath in the other. But you're still meant to use it in two hands primarily. Obviously I don't have to worry about a sheath dangling off me about it." He spins the handle on one finger before putting it down again. "Custom made. Obviously. Designing it to be seamless was the hard part." He could get into the details. Maybe one day he will. But he figures it won't be all that interesting.

"Might see best at a distance, but you know as well as anyone I'm just as good up close and personal."

"I'm going to sit on a roof and see what you're doing and how you're moving. The goal there's not for me to know you're good, it's so the next time this happens I know exactly what isn't gonna compromise you."

Is it because he's eager to do it? A little. Kind of. In a specific way. It really is mostly just that he can't see this playing out again unless he lets Clint go back to completely unsupported and that's not going to happen.

"Light's good."

"You're not gonna be my partner in this. You wanna do what I do, fine, we divide and conquer. Go to Uruguay while I'm in South Africa. If I'm boots on the ground in Indonesia, you can be in France. Wherever it feels necessary."

Is it this? Is this going to be the verbal fight that feels like it's been brewing since Steve showed up?

"I can't afford to even attempt what you're doing." That was the big realization of his walk. Wherein he wasn't actually out of his head. "No-one else can afford me to, either. Doesn't mean I'm not going to turn up again and if I do, I'd rather be better prepared to hand you your ass in a way that won't get in your way than relying on guess work."

Edited 2024-11-14 21:29 (UTC)

"You did great. You did exactly what you set out to do. I'm not too hurt I can't keep going. It'll hurt like a bitch, and I'm gonna be cursing at myself the whole damn time, but I can do it." He rubs a hand against his eyes for a moment before deciding, fuck it, hot food time. Still gonna argue, though. "I'll make a point to be extra careful about my chest. Anyone able to get a good solid shot in is probably gonna see me on the floor for a half second. I'm gonna be fine, though. And you can watch me be fine."

"Good." Because he intended to watch, anyway. Fun fact about Steve: He'll argue if he needs to, but he can turn into a goddamn brick wall there, too and just refuse. "Are you actually expecting me to try to jump in and take over, or are you just trying to get me to go away?"

Not doing that today, apparently. Hell the past couple.

"I'm trying to figure out if you've concocted some kind of plan where you tail me everywhere I go or if this was just some one-off to make sure I didn't die in a ditch. Cuz I was really leaning toward the latter, but you're starting to make me think the former." He leans on the counter with a brief sigh. "I'm trying to figure out what you want, cuz every time you tell me, and I think I've got a full picture, I swear something changes."

"If it helps, I don't know what I want, either, and every time I think I do, something in either what I want or think I can actually have changes." Wry, aware, apologetic, but also while still eating, because there's food in front of him. "I'm not going to tail you everywhere you go. I'm not going to try to participate in what you're doing. I'm not going to cut you entirely loose, because you're my friend. That's all I've got."

Okay. Actually. That helps. It helps to make Clint feel a little less crazy, that he isn't actually wildly misinterpreting everything this time. That Steve's lost at sea about this, too.

"Don't know how what you think you can have can change. World's your oyster. You set lofty goals, but you're down to earth about it."

"I don't even know how to talk about this without sounding like a dick to myself. 'Cause you're right. I've got every advantage there is. And I didn't expect this trip to be this much about me trying to work my own shit out and taking you on a roller coaster ride you didn't ask for or need."

He isn't opposed to trying though, since - well, napping with Clint and just time have at least evened out some of those rough edges. Hell, even just admitting that he is all over the place might have.

"I guess all it really comes down to is that I can't do what you're doing, because the second I let myself get that pissed off at the world, I'm dangerous to everybody. I can't do what Tony's doing because I... don't have that in me, anymore. I guess I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing now. Make sure you and everybody else knows there's a place to go if you need and want it, move between you and Nat, take the connection where I can get it, and... wait."

That all makes sense. Steve's caught between. He's got righteous anger in spades, but the kind of deep hurt balled up into a low burning rage that Clint's got is a different beast altogether. If Tony's given up, well, no, that's not a thing Steve can do, either. Have to keep moving until he finds his niche in this new world.

He catches onto a word Steve uses, though, and turns it over in his head. "You don't have as big a family as you did. And with you being Captain America in a world that might be a little this side of cynical about that icon, you can't exactly just go out and make new friends. You're lonely. You're frustrated. You want to do more than you're doing and don't know how to start. And you miss the connections you had before."

All Steve really expects to get from that is Clint to understand well enough that he's not trying to jerk Clint around, and to know where Steve landed. Be reassured by that knowledge that Steve's not going to start jumping into his fights with him.

What he got was being understood better than he expected to be, and the word 'lonely' landing harder than a punch to the gut, knocking the air out of him and for just a second making him want to cry. Doesn't, but does close his eyes and let his head thunk back against the wall behind him, softly.

"Yeah." That is... the long and short of it. He does sound vaguely like he might cry around the first word, then gets the rough tension out of his voice by clearing his throat. "So. I'll probably turn up again. I won't be in your way."

"...Well now I feel like kind of an asshole." He's not sorry. He cut to the heart of it enough to dig at Steve's emotions. But it's...an experience to hear that tone in Steve's voice.

Clint eases himself down to the floor, too. Floor buddies again. "I think you know that if I decided right now to come back, that wouldn't be enough. You lost a little too much. Not so much that who's left isn't enough, cuz that sounds rude as hell, right? But also...it isn't enough. You're missing more. And it fucking sucks."

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