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Clint knows that he’s not the most patient person. It gets worse when he has something he’d much rather be doing. Or for the day to be over so he and Phil can both be on their radios to talk. It’s not that he’s in a foul mood just because the weather had been bad enough that Phil’s been unable to be in range of the radio. Yes, he’s worried, but he’s more angry with the ridiculous build-up of ice that is taking way too much effort at the moment to clear away.
“Ow, fuck!” Natasha spits. She’s staying with Clint because her light has iced up too much. She was lucky to be able to leave the building before the door sealed shut with it. When Clint looks over, she’s shaking her hand.
“Y’okay?” Clint asks, carefully shuffling closer. The balcony around the watchroom is slick even with all the rocksalt they’d tossed down.
“Yes,” she replies gruffly. Tucking her hand under her armpit, she looks over at him. He can’t read her as well as he usually can because most of her face is covered with her scarf. “My hand slipped and I punched the window casing.” Clint raises his eyebrow and she rolls her eyes at him. “Bruised, not broken, Barton.”
“Hard to judge that out in the cold,” Clint retorts and she shoves him lightly with her shoulder. He slides a little but catches himself between the railing and the shovel in his hand. He doesn’t blow a raspberry at her because he’d rather not tempt freezing his lips together. He swats her butt with the shovel lightly and goes back to chipping the ice off the balcony as Natasha goes back to scraping the windows.
After maybe ten minutes, they switch jobs to work different sets of muscles. They give in when the sun starts to set and the cold gets worse. Natasha heads in first to stoke the fire. Clint has to warm up the watchroom so the light can run. It had nearly frozen and he would have just left it running all day if he could, but the electricity is already faulty at the moment and he’d rather not be a huge drag on it if he doesn’t have to.
Clint has kept the pilot light on just in case the power really does go out. It’s been years since the wick was lit throughout the night as the only way to ward off ships from the shore, but it isn’t as though he can’t do it. He checks the kerosene level and, out of precaution, tests the clockwork assembly to make sure it’s warm enough that he can turn the crank and wind it. He’d need to wind it at least every two hours to make sure the Fresnel lens spun at the right speeds to get the light to flash in the pattern that was, uniquely, Gallantry Light.
Once everything is settled (and the coffee is brewing) he heads downstairs to Natasha. His friend’s large White Shepherd meets him on the stairs. She carefully bounces around him once before dashing back down the stairs to her owner as Nat calls, “Chistota!” Clint’s glad to have the company, especially when the two of them get to curl up on the sofa with a warm, fuzzy heater across their laps.
Natasha’s dog is and always has been very well behaved. She doesn’t squirm in their laps, even when they end up resting their bowls on her back (still holding onto them of course). Her tail thumps against the cushion to Clint’s left and he pats her flank. “I think I’m going to call in a favor over to Fortune. See if Melinda’s in and if she’ll take some care packages out.”
Natasha pauses with her spoon halfway to her mouth. “Calling in a favor of that magnitude?”
“Well, I have a couple small ones. I’ll just owe her.” Natasha mutters something like “your funeral” and he nudges her with his elbow, huffing. He’ll deal with owing Melinda because he’d really rather send out backup batteries, MREs that could heat themselves, and extra warm clothing and blankets. He’d asked around for donations and the local quilter club got a whole party going and made blankets for every member of the local fishing boats.
He’s actually pretty tired when they head up to the watchroom and Natasha manages to strong arm him onto the cot to sleep. “I’ll keep watch,” she insists as Chistota lays on top of his legs so he can’t escape. “You’re tired, you’ve been running around all day, or breaking ice with me. Sleep, Barton.”
“Thanks, Nat,” he murmurs, tucking his hands near his face. He has a couple sailor’s knot bracelets around his wrist, stained by every time he’d held hands with Phil through the water. It still smells like the ocean and the scent comforts him as he drifts off to sleep.
Clint is snuggled into a thick wool sweater a week later, because it’s early Spring and the cold snap is lingering with a vengeance. There’s a frigid wind blowing down from the North and the watch room isn’t the warmest room in his place. At least he’s managed from icing over for the most part. He plucks at a loose thread on his sleeve when a crackle over his radio jerks his attention out to the horizon.
“Lamp,” it’s Dugan, and Clint can hear the smirk on his face. “Triskelion just came into sight. She’s goin’ ‘bout as fast as she can, I think.” Clint thanks him and resettles into his seat. Dugan wishes him a good night and signs off. They’ll be heading off, now that they’re no longer looking out for Phil. Clint’s itching to see the boat for himself, or even just hear the man over the radio.
“Hawkeye.” Phil greets, his voice warm. Clint just barely catches the chirp of Starbuck in the background before the radio cuts out.
“Loner,” he’s grinning so wide that he can hear it in his own voice. “I see you got my letter.”
“And the care package. Good timing too, ‘Buck chased his last ball off the ship the day before. And the food and warm clothing was real nice, too. I feel a bit bad that you sent your quilt along.” Clint can hear the rumbling purr from the adolescent cat and wonders if Phil’s lounging in bed with Starbuck on his chest. “I do have to wonder why you needed me in range for the fifth of March so badly that you’d have Melinda come out in her helicopter.”
Melinda May is a godsend, Clint reaffirms. The woman is a helicopter pilot from Fortune who did deliveries to St Pierre et Miquelon, Brunette Island, and sometimes all the way out to Sydney and the surrounding area on Nova Scotia. He owes her who knows how many favors for flying out to Phil’s Triskelion with a small carepackage and his present. And all the other ships she stopped by besides his lover’s.
Clint squirms in his seat a little and wraps his spare quilt tighter around himself. “Well,” he begins, snaking his hands out to curl around his stein of coffee, “that’s ‘cause you needed the blanket more’n me and I thought it’d be nice. You could pretend it was me wrapped ‘round you.”
Phil’s quiet for a moment, but it’s a warm, comforting silence. “I am.”
Clint grins and tries to muffle it in the rim of his stein for a moment. He still has another question to answer. “As for today, well... today was the first day we talked over the radio. A year ago, that is.”
Silence stretches between them but Clint’s content to wait on his man to respond. “Oh.” Well, he was hoping for a bit more than that.
“Oh…?” Clint tries prompting.
“I just…” Phil sounds a bit lost and Starbuck continues to purr. “I don’t know what to say?”
“It’s fine,” Clint lies. He feels dumb for getting all excited over this. Well, not about the part where he gets to talk to Phil after so long without him. But the part where he feels hurt but Phil’s lack of reaction over a whole year of… of this. This communication between them that had lead to the best thing in Clint’s life.
“It’s not. I’m clearly missing something here. Talk to me?” Phil’s half-whispering and he sounds apologetic. Clint just wants to blow it off as nothing but he can’t. He doesn’t want to be having a conversation like this where he can’t see or touch Phil; it makes it all the worse.
“Just…” Clint sighs and sets the stein down. He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. Use your words, Clint, he tells himself. The voice in his head sounds a lot like Natasha and he almost resents her for it. “I’ve only really got you and Nat, kinda Steve and Bucky too for friends. And I’ve known all of them since high school which was nearly three decades ago.” He shrugs and scoots down in his seat. “I was never really good at making friends, okay? My lovelife was even worse.”
The silence that answers him isn’t very encouraging, either. It doesn’t make him uncomfortable, but he wishes that Phil would say something anyway.
“...and now I have you. And you’re… you’re everything to me and I don’t know how to properly show it.” Clint wraps his arms around himself and tips his head forward to rest against his knees as the silence stretches out between them. Every second that passes weighs on his chest. He’s about to apologize and call himself stupid--something he’d thought Natasha had beaten out of him--when he hears a noise on the other side of the radio.
“Clint.” Clint waits, and listens. It’s Phil’s turn to talk, to explain himself. He’ll be patient and let him have his say. “I’m… I’ve never really been…” He trails off and there is a hint of frustration to his voice, as if he can’t find the words he wants to say. “Good.” It’s almost explosive in its suddenness after the stretch of silence. “At this stuff either.” Clint lets him putter on, not even giving him a sound of acknowledgement. He doesn’t want to mess him up while he’s starting to finally build some steam. “Expressing yourself wasn’t a requirement in the Navy. Over twenty years on a trawler by yourself even less so.” He sighs and Clint can hear Starbuck still purring as Phil holds the talk button down and broadcasts the silence from his bunk.
“And…?” Clint ventures after a moment. He hears himself echo on Phil’s end. He can hear in the quiet that Phil’s not done and something tells him that his Loner needs to finish what he’s trying to say.
“And I’m still trying to fight for the right words.” His voice is thick, as if he’s finding it harder and harder to talk. “I think I’ll always be trying to find the right words with you.”
“Phil,” he doesn’t want to make Phil over-expose himself. He’s already sounding a bit ragged and worn even though Clint can tell Phil’s not done yet.
“No.” Clint stiffens a little. “Please, let me… let me try to finish. I don’t want to mess this--us--up by stopping here. You deserve better than… I don’t want to ruin this. I might already have.”
“You haven’t.” Clint interjects softly, trying to soothe Phil as he falls back to waiting for Phil to finish.
“Good to know.” Starbuck chirps and his purring gets louder. Clint pictures him nuzzling up under Phil’s chin. The man in question sighs and starts again. “Just so we’re clear, this is all really hard for me to get out.”
“I caught that bit, yeah.” Clint smiles as Phil grumbles playfully at him. “Carry on.”
“Thanks.” Once again silence stretches between them. “I don’t want to ever make you feel underappreciated. For any reason.” Phil clears his throat. “I’m prepared to fight with my words because what I want… what I need to say is important, okay?”
“Okay.” Clint is smiling whether he wants to be or not. It starts small at first but starts to grow. “Get everything off your chest yet?”
“No. Clint…” He hears Phil shifting on his blankets. He listens as best as he can because he doesn’t want to miss anything. “I feel like there are so many other things that I should say but the words are still failing me. I’ll elaborate when the right words do come but until then…” Clint hears a shaky breath and his chest clenches in dread and anticipation. This could go in a few different ways and he’s not sure which one he’s holding out for. “Until then, just know that…”
Another shaky breath. Clint opens his mouth to say something but a trill from Starbuck stops him. The cat is trying to give Phil courage, he’s sure of it. He waits another few seconds before asking tentatively, “Phil?”
“I love you, Clint.”
Clint chokes a little and he stares out across the water to the lights that are the Triskelion. Oddly enough, his ears are ringing and he can’t seem to move his body as shock seeps in, cold and claiming. He’s still. He’s silent. He’s… probably making this pretty awful for Phil, to be honest.
“Clint--”
“Phil.” He cuts him off because Phil had sounded scared. “I just, wow, jeez. I--” Now it’s his turn to be at a loss for words. “Talk about droppin’ a bomb?” He jokes weakly. He rubs at his face, groaning. “Guess it’s my turn to mess everything up, huh? I... just... stars above, I didn’t expect that, okay?”
“Yeah, okay.” Phil sounds calmer now. “I don’t expect you to say it back. Not yet, at least. There’s no pressure.”
“Hey, whoa. Wait.” Clint chuckles out of nerves and drags his hand over his face before pushing his fingers through his mussed hair. “I… God damn it, I want to steal the motorboat two docks over and get out there right now and kiss you fucking stupid.” It’s a bit explosive, but Phil’s seen nervous and rambling Clint a few times now. “shit, Phil, I never in a million years would have thought you’d say it first. I’ve always… then it went to shit…”
“It’s not about who says it first,” there’s the tiniest hint of laughter in his voice.
“Yeah, well,” Clint shrugs even though Phil can’t see it. “If you’re gonna be the first to say it, I wanna be the first to say it in person, okay?” Phil makes a soft noise of surprise and it warms Clint’s belly more than coffee ever has. “But until then, the sentiment is mutual.”
“I can live with that,” Phil murmurs.
“You better,” Clint replies weakly.
Mutually, they silently agree to leave the heavy topic alone for now and update each other on how things have been. It takes a few minutes to get into the swing of things but Clint starts out after only flailing for a minute or two.
“Nat’s staying with me, the weather’s been awful enough inland that her Light’s frozen up. They’re radio warnings out to be really careful in the area because the power is down so her Light is dark. But if she’d stayed… she and Chistota prob’ly would have starved.”
“Glad she’s with you, then. Where…?”
“She’s downstairs. Promised to give me some time with you alone. She’ll send the dog up as a five minute warning.” Clint relaxes slowly and stretches his legs out. They’d started to cramp with how tightly he’d kept himself during their conversation.
“Nice of her.” Phil is nearly drowned out by the force of Starbuck’s purring. Phil makes a sounds as if he’s spitting cat hair out of his mouth. “‘Buck likes to think himself a scarf tonight.” Clint snorts. “At least he’s keeping his claws to himself. It’s pretty slick out here, so he’s been running around with his claws out constantly. If he doesn’t he slips from one side of the trawler to the other. He’s not a fan of skating, we’ve found.”
Clint laughs at the image of the little grey cat sliding across the deck. “Poor little kitten,” Clint sympathizes. A roaring purr over the radio answers him. “I’d’ve loved to have seen that, must have been hilarious.”
“Oh, it was. He sulked on my pillow for the rest of that day.” The radio is silent for a moment even though it sounded like Phil was about to say something. “...he bit my chin. I think he knew we’re talking about him.”
Clint laughs over the microphone, just so Starbuck can hear him. He’s about to say something when the clatter of claws up the stairs alerts him to Chistota’s arrival. She waits until he pushes his chair back to half-hop into his lap. She snuffles the microphone in his hand. “Chistota’s here. She’s Nat’s white shepherd. Say hello?”
Chistota leans back as Clint holds the microphone back. She barks once, short. “Shush, quiet hello.” She barks again, much quieter.
Phil laughs. “Smart dog. ‘Buck’s not impressed at all.”
“Did he run scared?” Clint buries his fingers into Chistota’s thick coat and scratches her through the fur.
“Nah, he’s a bit fluffier though.” He chuckles. “I take it this means Natasha’s going to be coming up soon?”
“Yeah.”
“Then I’ll let you go, I should be sleeping anyway.” He can hear him yawning and Clint smiles fondly.
“Sleep well, Loner.”
Phil hums. “Yeah.” He chuckles a little, but it’s clear he’s drifting off slowly.
“What’s so funny?” Clint asks softly, in case he’s already asleep.
“Nothin’.” Phil’s voice is sleepy and warm. “Love you, Hawkeye.” The following click means that he’s turned the radio off.
Clint blushes and hides his face in Chistota’s fur and waits for Natasha to come upstairs.
Clint manages to contain his emotions until Natasha is taking her turn and Clint is laying on the cot with Chistota covering him like a breathing blanket. She’s wonderfully huge and it’s probably something that Natasha had been looking for on purpose. He continues to dig his fingers into her coat, contemplating everything. Eventually Nat yanks the pillow out from under his head and tosses it at him. “Speak, boy.”
Clint huffs and pulls the pillow off his face. Chis lifts her head and puts it on the pillow resting on his chest. If he wasn’t going to use it, the dog might as well get to. “I thought you were done hearing about my feelings?” He raises an eyebrow challengingly.
“Only when you continue to be my entertainment. You’re borderline moping and it’s not attractive at all.” She side-eyes him before turning back to look outside. It’s easier for the both of them to talk about emotions if they’re not making eye contact.
Clint fidgets a little. “Phil told me he loves me.” He glances over at Natasha and takes in the stiffness of her frame. He listens to her slow and perfectly measured breathing. He’d caught her off guard. “Yeah, I know, Nat. ‘Love is for children’.”
Natasha turns to catch his eye. “That’s not the whole saying, Ptichka.” Clint waits for her to continue patiently. “That’s just the first half. ‘Love is for children, for only grownups prefer fear’.”
“What’s that s’posed to mean?” Clint asks before really thinking about it. Natasha gives him a stern look, as though she is really the last person to be asking that. He wait her out and she sags into her chair. Green eyes break from his and she stares out to Phil’s trawler.
“I think… I think it means that when we grow up, we’ve seen so much of what’s ugly in the world that we are too afraid the give love as freely as we did when we were young and dependent on those older than us.” Natasha has her arms wrapped around her and Clint wants to hug her. He nudges Chistota off of him and grabs the blanket. He drapes it around them both and she looks up gratefully for a moment. He rests his chin on the top of her head. “We’re now the older ones,” he feels her voice through his jaw, “to look out for the young, and we’ve been beaten down by Life and its trials.”
“So you’re calling me childish.” It’s not what he’s gotten at all out of her words, but he can’t help but tease her. She pinches his side hard enough to hurt but he lets her. True sibling love, right there.
“I’m calling Phil brave.”
“I basically said it back.” He hadn’t told her that part.
Another pinch. “Basically?”
“I’m waiting to see him in person.” He wraps his arms around her shoulders and scooches down a little to rest his head on her shoulder.
Natasha nods and leans her cheek against his. “Then you are brave too.”
Together they watch the dark horizon, lit up only by Phil’s lights on the water.