(I should note that this a continuation of a silly little club AU I posted EXACTLY one year ago, but you don't have to read that to know what's going on!)

It was easy to ignore the mess the night before, because there had been only a sliver of moonlight sliding between the curtains, and even less than that between their bodies as Natasha pressed Clint towards his bed. Darkness had disguised the laundry piles and overflowing trash can in shadows, and besides, he liked to think that--though he was out of practice--he was still doing an okay job of holding her attention.
Steve had sworn up and down that rebounding was horrible, but Clint, so far, had no complaints whatsoever. Of course, this might have been because he hadn’t realized this was a date until Natasha had tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow, twisted her lipsticked smile into a flirtatious smirk, and murmured, “I’ve got to get out of these heels.”
And whether it was the way the OPEN sign had sizzled neon highlights into her red hair, or the tilted curve of her hip as she stood, or just the fact that it’d been a long time since he’d lingered with someone beautiful far past midnight, Clint had found it too easy to suggest that she stay with him instead of schlepping all the way back up to Little Ukraine. “Bed-Stuy is closer,” he’d reasoned, though it wasn’t, really, and she’d curled such thrilling frisson around her agreement that he shouldn’t have been surprised by the way she’d kissed him against the door and out of his clothes.
But now, now, golden light was seeping like honey into his loft, and everything that light touched was a cluttered jumble of chaos. There were cheese balls spilled across the couch next to a pile of underwear whose last date of wash was indiscernible, especially since his building’s washing machine was broken and so he’d recently been washing his clothes in the sink--except, well, he hadn’t had much motivation to do the dishes lately and so the sink was piled too high with greasy plates to do much laundry, anyway.
Normally, Clint enjoyed waking up early, especially when there was someone gorgeous curled against his chest, but he couldn’t just lie there and let himself get turned into a one night stand horror story, especially since he would prefer for whatever this was to last longer than one night. Natasha slept like ivy, her limbs twined around his like they belonged there, and it was the hardest thing in recent memory to trade her sleepy embrace for rubber gloves. He knew, in his heart of hearts, that having a clean apartment wasn’t going to change whether not not she’d see him again, but it created enough false hope to motivate him through taming the monster pile of plates, dusting all the orange residue off the couch, and, for lack of better solutions, hiding all the laundry in the bottom of his coat closet.
He was drying dishes and brewing coffee when Natasha appeared in the kitchen, sheets tied up under her arms like some kind of goddess. “I like your apartment,” she said, her fiery hair tumbling across her shoulders as she looked around. With a smile that he could only describe as wicked, she added, “It was a lot, mm, scarier last night, though. Nothing that bad,” she assured him with a glint in her eye, “Just stepped on an unexpected cheese ball or five in the bathroom.”
Clint slumped against the counter. It was one thing to be a general slob, but a disgusting bathroom, he knew, was the kiss of death. “I guess that means you don’t want to go for brunch,” he said, trying not to let defeat creep into his tone; this was, after all, his own damn fault.
For a moment, the only sound was the percolation of the coffee, and then Natasha laughed. “You idiot,” she said, pulling his face down to hers. “It means that tonight, we stay at my place.”