Title: But if life were only moments, then you'd never know you had one
Cliché: Being bad at feelings, Big I Love You moments
Rating: G

Natasha doesn't rank her partners.

Really, she doesn't.

But if she did, one day, decide it would be fun to think about bests and worsts, she figures Clint would be somewhere in the top half.

See, she likes sex. It's fun, it feels good, and the way Natasha figures, it's just a perk of the job that sometimes gorgeous criminals want to spend hours worshiping her body. She's not much for the clean-cut soldier type, the kind of man Clint is, but she finds him pleasing enough, kind enough, and just adventurous enough to not kick him out when he snuggles in.

So maybe he's top twenty. Top ten if she counts people she didn't have to sleep with for work. But she's number one for him.

She knows that because he tells her constantly, like she needs the assurance, like she'd be worried if her partner was less than over the moon with a fuck or two. The way she figures, as long as everyone had a good time and got their bells rung, she's not much in the way of a worrier.

("Getting your bell rung" is something she picked up from Steve, who really has the best colloquialisms to steal, hands down. Tony might be faster with a retort or an obnoxious nickname, but Steve has these charming turns of phrase that don't feel like he spent hours practicing them in from of a mirror, which she appreciates more.)

Anyway, sex with Clint, which has been a constant in their relationship as long as they've had a relationship, is good, and Natasha doesn't really have any complaints.

It's six years, two months and 16 days into their partnership that Natasha realizes she and Clint are in love.

Well, she knew she loved him, because she'd figured that out relatively quickly – despite what she tried to pretend outwardly, Natasha had to be in touch with her feelings. If she wasn't, how could she understand and manipulate anyone else's? – but she's never considered being in love with him, which was somehow different because apparently her deficient childhood is calling and she needs to go through puberty again.

He's not doing anything special when she figures it out. In fact it's the exact opposite of special – she's still in bed, in the apartment they keep outside of Stark Tower because fuck you, Tony, that's why, and he's pulling socks on, his hair still damp from the shower.

She notices a million tiny things in that moment – the way he's getting older, the way he favors his right shoulder, the way he's getting a little soft around his hips because she's closer now to forty than thirty, and that's what bodies do. And something moves in her stomach, a kind of tightening that she doesn't rightly understand.

"Hey," Natasha says, and Clint turns to look at her. "I love you."

Clint smiles. "I love you, too."

It's not what she means, though, what he's saying, because what she means is she loves him, but there's no real way she can see to say that, unless in involves using those words, which feel downright silly to her.

So instead she gets up and makes coffee. She figures that's close enough.