brandingproblem | open post

"I think one of us is being a smartass, and I can't tell who." Spoilers, it's both of them, and he knows it. Steve's grin inspires a little smile of his own, all in good fun.

"It's good." Which feels inadequate. "I looked like that once?" And also, visually, now, but in the emotional sense... "Dunno, feels like you're reaching for days long past. Which I'm not opposed to." Or maybe some of the softness and gentleness and cuddling and touches inspired a softer look out of him. Maybe he's not giving himself enough credit.

Maybe he's not giving Steve enough credit, for sure.

It's definitely both of them, though Steve--

He shakes his head a little, and taps his pencil against the drawing, right between the sketch's eyes. "That is the expression that was on your face right before I started drawing and that made me want to draw again."

You're still in there, Clint. Damaged and hurting and changed, for sure, but in there. You are still a person, not just a killing machine.

"I--" Clint blinks in surprise. "It is?" Mr. Photographic Memory wouldn't lie to him. Has not once lied to him.

His own face does something complicated. Guarded but curious but concerned but considering but--complicated. He sees the evidence in front of his face and can understand where Steve's been coming at him from. Not suggesting he isn't what he is now, but that he is also still Clint. Whatever that means these days. But it's hard to fathom. Difficult to accept. The same as taking solace in a touch. Like it isn't for him, like it's some kind of betrayal to have it.

But Steve's able to step back and see the whole of him. Not just the darkness.

"Glad I could inspire something nice," is what he eventually says.

Maybe he's not really doing Clint any favors, drawing attention to the fact that he is still a person, that he is still him just changed. Maybe he should stop not just creating space for there to be more, but almost demanding it.

But he can't just let Clint disappear entirely. Not into a global mission, not inside himself. Not when he's right there and in reach.

Steve has never wanted to touch anybody as badly as he wants to touch Clint just then. The position they're in stops him from doing it - can't do it easily so that means there's a gap to check himself - but God he wants to.

He puts the pencil down but doesn't close the book, just stays half pivoted so he can keep seeing Clint. Keeps a bit of a smile, but one that does actually reach his eyes. "So am I."

Steve's so open. Happy, in this moment at least. Genuine. And it's so hard not to let that seep into him in turn. His gaze turns from the drawing to Steve, and he's struck by that smile and that sincerity.

He ducks his head, a little smile tugging at the corner. Ah, so that's a taste of humble pie, huh. "You're good at this." And he's not exactly talking about the art, here. Clint rests a hand lightly on Steve's shoulder. "Thanks for being you."

Steve reaches up and gives Clint's hand on his shoulder a slow, careful, squeeze. He suddenly has... a dozen pictures he wants to draw, and they're all Clint.

None that he'd show Clint, at least any time soon, because they're not at all sexual but are intimate. He might draw them just to get the ideas out of his head, and never show Clint. Or show him two years from now.

Regardless, his hand on Clint's is warm, and brief and careful and then gone. "You get everything you needed to done?"

"Yeah. Tomorrow's just gonna be my stupid meditative shit and a lot of otherwise hurrying up and waiting. You'll get to see the whole getup in action. Don't laugh at it." All costumes are inherently silly, to be perfectly honest, which Steve would know all too well.

The hand is there, and present, and then gone, and Clint slides his hand away as well. "You get everything you needed?"

A question deliberately phrased.

"Hey. Even I picked up some stupid meditative shit somewhere. It's useful." Just, you know, pointing that out while he tries to figure out Clint's phrasing and decide what Clint's offering and if it's an offer or a check in or - "I'm pretty okay right now. You can figure out bedtime arrangements then and I'll go with whatever works for you."

What he needs and what he wants don't exactly align often. Mostly because he doesn't need a hell of a lot and unless he's so depressed he can't function what he wants is... something, albeit usually nothing he can have. This isn't fundamentally different. Just... easier.

"Apparently, if nothing else, I'm taking the bed. If you want to also be in the bed, I'm amenable to that." Maybe he'll hold Steve a little. Maybe he'll just take comfort in a warm and breathing body next to him. It's unclear. "Living heating pad might be nice," with a quirk of his lips.

"If you're amenable, I'm curling up with you - or you can curl up around me. Whatever works best for the heating pad aspect." Look... he... is never turning down that kind of contact.

...that's a lie.

He's never turning down that contact from someone he knows, trusts, and care about. Anyone else would just get punched at this point.

"However we end up, I don't really want you at my back." At least he can admit that, with an apologetic little shrug. "I trust you. You know I do. Just hard to shake the feeling is all." Of someone there, just behind him, while he's physically vulnerable.

"You gonna stay up a bit? Get more drawing in now that you're all inspired?"

"I've been trying to avoid putting you between me and the wall. Can just roll over so we're both facing the wall, face each other again, or flip it around so I'm curled up with you and my back. Hell, I can sleep on my back if you're okay with that." Well lay on his back. "We've got options."

That said, he glances at the book, then out the window, then back at Clint. "Yeah. I'm probably going to take an hour, finish this and see if an idea I just got for the view can turn into something I like."

"We've got options," he agrees. "I don't mind the wall. And maybe I'll come around to you at my back. We'll figure it out. Think I'm gonna start with my back to it, so it leaves room for you. Whenever you come to bed."

There it is again, all at once, that ashy taste as his mouth dries out and everything suddenly feels like the edge of an impossibly deep pit. He grips tight the back of the chair, breathes hard for a moment. Just a few moments. Then flashes a meek grin, laughs in a way that seems too breathy to count as one. "Haven't had to think about sleeping positions in a while."

Hasn't had to worry about someone coming to bed, since.

He has to move so he can unglue himself from this spot. "We'll figure it out. I'm not worried. Take your time." And then he's moving, and just that small action seems to help keep him from getting too stuck.

If this had happened 12 hours ago, Steve would have been much more thrown than he is now. Now? Now, Clint's trying to give him context for the upset. Clint's trying to explain to Steve. The context itself is helpful, sure. The act of putting in the effort to use words and explain, even through that kind of grief?

That gives him more hope than anything so far that Clint might just not end up bleeding out in a gutter. That? Is a man who is making an effort to at least be understood, even if... well more raw than finessed, maybe uneven, but those aren't things Steve would recognize or care about, either.

He stays put in his chair, but leans back and wedges one leg up, so the table edge is dug into his shin and his heel is just balanced on the seat. Keeps his eyes on Clint, but not in an overly intense way, not judging or calculating.

"It's okay to worry about it." Just that. "It's also okay if it hurts like hell, you know it's going to hurt like hell and you want to try, anyway. I know what's going on. You don't need to fake your way through the shitty part to keep me from flinching away from you." Because nothing in there said 'I don't want to'. Everything just said 'it's hard'.

It feels like pointed barbs digging in. And he knows that's not what Steve's going for. That doesn't keep the feeling from happening. They've been skirting around talking about any of this too directly, save for when Steve had so bluntly pointed out that the magnitude of their losses were incomprehensibly different. And he does not want to get too direct about it, because he's pretty sure he'll collapse in on himself, simply stop and never start again, break and shatter into too many pieces to clean up.

And maybe he won't, but is that a risk he's willing to take?

"I'm not worried," he repeats in a little snap. "And everything hurts like hell, all the time." He would prefer not to be an open wound every second of every day. Sometimes one has to suture himself back up. "If you wanna deal with my shitty parts right now, this is a hell of a time for it."

Steve figures that is a pretty predictable, fair, and not terrible response. He's even a little relieved that there's a snap in there, for reasons that have nothing to do with his own... issues around literally every person still in the world and the ones who aren't.

He doesn't flinch away from any of it, doesn't interrupt and in fact just waits on Clint to be done and then another couple of seconds in silence. Because he meant what he said and that's not changing.

"It was a statement and offer, not a demand." He leans forward, somewhat awkwardly since he's got one of his own legs wedged between himself and the table, and drags the sketch book over to himself, flips back to that view, and props it open against his knee.

He doesn't need a fight right now. He already got an extremely good one that set a lot of things feeling right, feeling more whole, feeling good. But god damn, sometimes he wishes Steve would just fight him. Verbally sparring, anyway. Instead of just making his statements and his offers and being a well of calm in the face of Clint's volatility.

If Steve wasn't such a friend, or maybe if this was yesterday, or maybe if Clint was just a hair pettier, he'd use it as an excuse to dig in, to drag a fight out of this by force if he has to. But they were in such a good place, and...he shouldn't ruin that. Just because Steve placed a finger on a nerve for a moment.

His jaw works in frustrated annoyance, weighing his options, before he turns away and makes himself get the hell to bed.

If Clint decides to try and get a (real) verbal fight out of Steve, he's going to get some more insight into Steve's current mental health (or maybe just confirmation) that he probably doesn't want and Steve definitely doesn't want him to have.

Hell, Steve might get some insight that Steve doesn't want.

He stays where he is, awkward position and all, for a solid couple of hours, experimenting with that sketch. Not quite paying attention to what he's doing as he adds shading and shifts the perspective to something that includes some of the room, the window, even the suggestion of glass and looking out into the view.

When he finally gets up, he just closes the book and leaves it on the table, with the pencil on top, goes to the bathroom to brush his teeth, shuts off all the lights and goes to bed. In front of Clint, back to him. Doesn't avoid him, let's contact happen where it will.

Getting to sleep isn't all that hard. Even with a heightened emotional state, he knows how important proper rest is. More than a nap, actual sleep. He just has to try and shut his own stupid brain off first.

Steve joining in later, no idea how much later, of course wakes him. He can feel the stiffness starting to creep back in that's going to be a bitch to deal with later, but for now, it's not any effort to assess the situation, take in that it's Steve coming to bed, try not to overanalyze the whole thing, and then throw an arm over Steve's middle. His chest aches like hell, so his press up to Steve's back isn't intense, but present and touching and warm.

It's a little awkward. Because all he can think for a blazingly painful moment is how Steve feels nothing like Laura. Too big, too broad, too solid. Not enough hair. His hand tenses up over Steve's stomach even as he tucks his head close to Steve's neck, and then makes himself relax it again.

He's curious if Steve's going to have any response. Before dropping back into sleep.

He has not a single concern about Clint at his back. Worrying about his physical safety isn't a thing Steve really does, or has ever done - even when he should, even when he was about a hundred and twenty pounds, soaking wet.

That doesn't mean there isn't a reaction. It's just mostly an emotional one and he doesn't see it coming or expect it at all. His stomach tightens briefly under Clint's hand before he manages to stop it with an almost impossibly soft sound. Then he closes his eyes, curls his body around Clint's arm. Brings both arms up, fingers of one hand woven into his own hair, face buried in his own forearms.

Clamps his teeth together and resolutely does not let his breathing change or tension creep into his body to disturb Clint. But also absolutely falls apart and silently cries. Can't stop it, doesn't really try to. Just focuses on not letting it translate into physical tension or noise.

He doesn't even know why he's crying, exactly. Something about Bucky, or Sam, or just how fucking goddamn impotent he is and has been for ... years, and feels fucking stupid and selfish for it.

And will absolutely end up asleep, anyway.

Feels that brief tension, hears that soft sound, finds it hard to interpret without seeing him. This had to be expected, so it can't be a surprise. Maybe Steve simply really needed this and felt it unfair to ask for it?

Or there's something going on that they are probably not going to talk about. Clint's gotten the very distinct sense of avoiding something, or a few large somethings, and if they end up doing this shit again, there's probably only so long it can be avoided.

It's like Steve said. It hurts, and he knew it was going to hurt, and he's doing it anyway. Because there's also something about it that doesn't hurt. And Clint might be a fucking one man killing machine these days, but if he can offer a little bit of comfort in turn to a friend who so willingly offered up so much to him...

Then he can drift off tucked up against Steve with an arm curled around him.

Steve is pretty sure he can do this and not talk about himself indefinitely. Sadly, he's pretty sure if he expects Clint to talk, he's going to have to. Not that he'd know what to say.

Meanwhile after he gets that... unwanted and unexpected emotional release, undignified though it is, he sleeps and he sleeps hard. Especially for a guy who can, under pressure, go days with no sleep and didn't really expect to sleep at all.

In fact he barely stirs for hours and when he does it's because the light insists on stabbing him in the eyes. He groans as he straightens out and stretches. Then pretty much rolls out of the bed and then up to his feet. Still groggy but headed for the bathroom and then to start coffee.

Steve moving means it's awake time, and daylight means he probably shouldn't roll over and go back to sleep, even if the temptation is there. Clint flops to his stomach, sprawled over the vacated spot with an impetuous sound, and regrets the little things, like being alive and conscious. Ugh. Who invented that?

When he pushes himself up, he can feel the protest in his shoulders, the stiffness in his neck threatening to become a raging tension headache, the way it feels like each and every rib throbs with his pulse.

Well, the workout this morning is going to be a fun one, but he'll push through. Coffee first. Always coffee first. He gives Steve's sketchbook a glance when he shuffles into the kitchen, but it's closed and he's not about to snoop, not just yet.

Steve sets the bottle of Aleve beside his sketchbook on the table between getting coffee brewing and pulling mugs down.

The silence isn't a refusal to talk, or awkward for him. It's just being unusually sleepy and a little... stuck in his head, trying to work out what the fuck happened with him last night, and thinking about Clint's... activity for the day, and his own positioning and mental preparation for the potential for it to go straight to hell. Just fragmented nonsense that doesn't want to (and Steve doesn't want to) turn into anything too real.

Once he does talk? It's pretty normal. "I don't think I've slept that hard in a decade. I kinda feel like I got hit by a truck and I don't even have anything physical to blame it on. You doing ok?"

"Ouch. Could at least pretend I gave you a hard workout for pride's sake." He gives a nod of thanks for the pills, because yes of course he's going to down an unhealthy amount again. Just for today. "You look like shit. But like, well-rested shit, so you must've really needed that sleep."

He knows if he simply ignores the question, Steve will still want an answer. His movements are a little clunky, so he's clearly not great, but the question is probably also from an emotional standpoint. So. Better figure out an answer.

"Stiff as a board and hoping to do some solid work today." Tonight, whatever. It's not a great answer and he knows it.

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