A Gift From: spectralarchers
Type Of Gift: Fic
Title: Third time's the charm- or the fourth. Or fifth.
A Gift For: mitchpell
Rating: Rated T
Warnings: Mild hospital settings, some blood mention and gun usage.
Summary/Prompt Used:5+1-five times Clint made it home for Christmas and one time he didn’t or flip it, five times he didn’t make it home and one time he did.
Author's Note: I hope I did it right, by alternating the different POVs and the different ways these scenarios could unfold. I hope you like it ♥


Third time's the charm- or the fourth. Or fifth.

DATE: Christmas 2011
LOCATION: Barton Houseshold, Waverly, Iowa, United States of America
(Timeline: Pre-MCU)

She had hoped that Clint would have made it home in order to help her put the Christmas lights up on the house. There are no neighbors to impress with them, but it’s always been their thing - ever since they moved out into Clint’s parents’ old farm, it had been a thing. To set up the Christmas lights together, and argue again and again if the warm white blinking light bulbs should be one inch higher or lower than what they usually, only for them to set them up the exact same way they’ve set them up for the past many years.
Clint hasn’t made it home yet.
But other members of the family have. Barney made it to Waverly three days ago, showing up with a black eye and what Laura is pretty sure is a bullet wound in his bicep that looks like he’s sewed himself up. He took it upon himself to set up the Christmas lights, and Laura suspects that this is the way they used to be when him and Clint lived in the house as kids, because he knows exactly where the different lights are supposed to be. Either that or he’s freakishly good at remembering where her and Clint have been putting them for the past last years.
Laura’s sister is here too. She flew in from New York as soon as her classes ended, and had managed to finish her papers before that too, so that she could enjoy the holiday time with her family entirely without having to worry about her homework. Kate, as it turns out, has opinions about where the Christmas lights are supposed to be, but Laura knows that it’s just a way for her to entertain the kids.
Cooper has entered the stage where he doesn’t care whether the tree is gold or red, or silver and blue, or something else entirely, and is more focused on helping Barney out with some more hands on things. Lila, on the other hand, has found a YouTube tutorial about braided paper stars that she saw on Pinterest, while she was scrolling with Laura’s phone.
It’s been a recurring discussion that Clint wasn’t home for Thanksgiving, because he had promised that he would, and he hadn’t made it. Clint had made it up for them though.
“Uncle Frank, and Maria and Lisa and Frank Jr will come too!” he’d told them, and Laura had told him, after the kids had gone to bed, that he better help with prepping the food for four more mouths to feed, and Clint had gently kissed her lip and said not to worry, because he would go and get the biggest bird he could find, and if it wasn’t big enough, he’d break out the camo and go find the biggest bird in the wild if he had to.
Laura had told him to shut the fuck up, Clint, and told him to go to bed, because he was slightly tipsy and she had to get up next morning.
Clint’s supposed to come home for Christmas, though. He is supposed to come home, and Laura is awaiting a call from him the next day that’ll let him know which commercial flight SHIELD will have managed to put him on, so she’s not worried. Not yet. Not when the phone rings and all she expects is some grandparents moaning about them doing Christmas in Waverly again and how it’s too cold or hard to get out there and her shutting them up about it, because come on dad, you can drive your Jeep down here if you need to, no need to whine.
When the line connects with the person at the other end of the line, though, Laura knows that shit is either going down or is about to go down.
“Laura, it’s Frank.”
It’s nothing more other than three words, but she knows. She can hear it in the way he inhaled when she answered and the way the words came out to fast for it to mean anything good, and she knows this feeling too well - it’s the same feeling she got when Nick called to say that Clint had been shot by a Russian defector from a spy programme and was in hospital, it’s the same feeling she got when the doctors told her that her baby boy would have to stay in the hospital because of respiratory problems that had occurred during his birth, and it’s the same feeling she got when Nick had told her that Clint was getting sent to Iraq to work with an off the books mission.
All the alarm bells had gone off, and now they’re ringing again, except this time it’s not worry. It’s knowledge that whatever her entire being yelled for had happened.
“What happened?” she huffs into the phone, her hand shaking. Barney looks up from the light he’s untangling with Cooper, and Laura shakes her head ever so slightly. He begins to talk about the light a little louder than necessary in order to keep Cooper from hearing her conversation on the phone.
There’s a sigh, and something she thinks is Frank spitting, before he answers. “It turned to shit, Laura- the- there was an ambush and it all went to hell. We- I-”
“How is Clint?” she demands.
“He’s- he’s alive, that much I can say,” he says, and she can almost see him biting his lip, because she knows Frank, she knows when he’s lying and when he’s trying to hide things he’s not supposed to talk about, but this? There’s something he’s not saying and her brain is going at a thousand miles per hour because she has thought about these scenarios a million times, and she can’t- she has to-
“But, I fucked up, Laura. We fucked up,” Frank adds, forcing her to listen to him instead of listening to her own thoughts. The line isn’t all too clear, and there’s some noise that she her brain decides to interpret as medical jargon, but she knows that it can’t be. There are no phones in the medibay while there’s surgery going on. “An IED- they- there was an IED, and we missed it because of some assholes- Curt- Curt lost his leg, and- and I fucked up, Laura.”
“What happened to Clint?” Laura bites, this time, and she hears something fall on the floor behind her, followed by footsteps. She rubs her temple as she closes her eyes. If Clint isn’t dead, then what? What happened?
“He was- he was right there, and the- I’m sorry Laura, but Doc’s saying Clint’s ears are dead,” Frank finally explains through one breath and grit teeth, and Laura’s hand flies to her mouth at the news.
She can’t find her words, and as Frank’s raspy breath intake fills the the quiet, she forces herself to swallow the bile that managed to rise to her throat.
“He- he- he’s deaf? He’s- he can’t hear?” she stutters. She looks over her shoulder to see where Barney and Cooper had gone, and when she sees Barney’s legs on the ladder she can see through the kitchen window, she lets out a sob, but manages to hold herself together so as to not start crying right then and there.
Frank rasps for breath again, and she wonders for half a second if he’s hurt too, if he’s- has he phoned Maria? He speaks again, interrupting her line of thought. “I- the doctors say that he’s lost- he hasn’t lost everything, as far as they can tell, but- I don’t- I just- we won’t make it to Christmas, I’m sorry, Laura.”
The line dies as soon as Frank’s sentence does, and she drops hers on the floor. The battery case breaks off and the two small batteries fly down under the counter, but all Laura can do is stand there and look around the house. The Christmas tree is only halfway done, Barney’s still outside working on the lights with Cooper, Kate’s working with Lila on braiding stars and- and- and-
“Clint, oh my God,” she whispers to herself as she picks up the parts of the phone and set them on the counter, as she heads up the stairs, taking them two and two, to make for the bathroom.


DATE: Christmas 1997
LOCATION: New York City, New York, United States of America
(Timeline: Pre-MCU)

It’s his first assignment with a new handler. He’d had Phil Coulson as a handler for most of his training, but this is the first time that he’s out on a mission with Melinda May as his handler.
He’s a kid, still, in Melinda’s eyes, but he’ll make do, in time. It had been a battle to get him to join SHIELD in the first place, but after a couple of weeks in Phil’s care, Clint had turned out to be one of the better agents, in spite of the odds staked against him. It wasn’t like he was the model Academy Junior: he had barely made it into high school, had trouble spelling, had some hearing issues reminiscent from his early childhood and his abusive father, and… Well, that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Melinda still remembers reading his file and thinking that he was not going to be a good investment of resources. She was wrong, she thinks, as she notices Clint sitting in one of the playground area chairs, pretending to be making some crosswords.
It’s a good thing he’s managed to make people believe that he just doesn’t want to write up mission reports, rather than him actually fumbling with words and spelling. Phil and Melinda play along with the game, because they know how hard Clint struggles with it. He was never a good speller, but it’s getting better. He’s forcing himself to read, if anything.
The mission is simple - they’re in a shopping mall, it’s the 22nd of December, hell is loose with all the customers who are currently trying to get their last Christmas shopping done before everything goes to hell the day after, and it should be fairly easy to get some intel on the road a drug carrier uses through the mall. They’re thinking he goes through the staff exits, but they’ve covered those for the past three days, and there has been no successful point of exit in it, and so, they’ve decided to put Clint right in the middle of it all and hope that he’ll be able to follow the culprit out and give them the intel on the exit route.
It goes out of hand way too fast for Melinda to actually be sure it isn’t just a distraction, but when she sees on the security footage they’ve gained access to that a robbery is ongoing at the one Wells Fargo bank in the mall, she just hopes for hell and high water that the robbers don’t go into the McDonald’s right next door, because there’s a child’s birthday celebration going on in there. There has to be at least 15 kids, if not more, within a couple of feet from a robbery that’s already put live bullets into the ceiling.
“Barton-”
She barely even finishes giving her order into his earpiece before he’s jumped out of the seat in the recreation area and is moving against the current of people running out of the way, towards the bank.
She hears him in her earpiece as he shoves elbows and knees into people to get there: “I got it.”
It’s spoken through grit teeth, and she can hear screams and yells, and the mall security is trying to get from A to B, and it’s a whole big panic, but there is Clint, 26 year old rookie SHIELD agent on his first solo mission, going upstream in a widespread robbery, going heads on towards the robbers.
It’s when he rolls into the McDonald’s that Melinda frowns, because she loses him off the cameras - the fast food restaurant has its own cameras, and those, they do not have access to. She curses, as she demands someone give her some sort of feed from inside, but it’s all gone.
The robbers all seem to converge on the bank this time, where the security measures are being set into motion, alarms and sirens blaring, and one of the robbers decides to go rogue and enters the fast food place.
“Barton, speak to me!” she says, but gets no reply, hearing only grunts, barks and what she thinks is a muffled scream and a silenced gunshot.
When it goes quiet in her earpiece, she rips it out and runs out of the van, parked outside the mall, and forces her way inside. She bypasses security by showing her SHIELD badge, and makes her way through the mass of people making for the emergency exits.
After a couple of minutes, she makes it to the McDonald’s. The kids are nowhere to be seen, and when she moves past the restaurant, to the bank, she notices that all the robbers have been not only unmasked, but have been zip-tied using their own devices and are sitting on the ground.
“Hawkeye?” she asks, reverting to his code-name now that they’re in the field.
She walks into the bank, as mall security urges her not to. She walks all the way into the back, hoping that she would not find Clint dead on the floor.
What she does find, both warms her heart and make her go pale.
The one robber who had decided to go for the McDonald’s is dead on the floor, neck broken so there’s no blood, and Clint is cradling a child, who has buried his face in the crook of Clint’s neck.
“Barton?” she asks, again, gentler this time and his head whips up.
“Put the gun away,” he says, quietly, as he strokes the kid’s hair, quietly moving his chest back and forth in a rocking motion. He’s also making sure the kid can’t look up from the crook of his neck too. She sees the pool of blood that’s slowly forming underneath Clint, and her mind connects. He got shot, and he killed the robber.
“What happened?” she asks, as she kneels in front of him, as he keeps on rocking the kid back and forth, even though it visibly causes him pain.
He clears his throat, winces as he readjusts himself, and looks around. “Thought he could use the kid as a human shield,” he replies, as he pushes himself slightly forward. Melinda puts out his hand for him, and he takes it, as he gently whispers to the kid to keep his eyes closed, we’re gonna walk back to McDonald’s, alright?
The blood has soaked his civilian clothing - he wasn’t wearing any kevlar or reinforcements underneath the shirt. He is good for a trip to the hospital, that much Melinda knows.
A couple of minutes later, the kid has been returned to the birthday party and mall security has taken over the dealings on scene. Clint is lying on a stretcher, a medic bandaging his side as they try and keep the bleeding from getting out of hand.
“Looks like he won’t make it home for Christmas,” one of the medics says, and Melinda bites her lower lip, as she looks over at Clint. “Says he’s got a wife to get back to,” the medic adds, and Melinda nods.
“That he does. She’ll kill me if he doesn’t, but there’s always New Year’s, right?” she says, quietly, as she thanks the medic for his attention, dismissing him. She looks over at Clint, a fondness in her eyes.
“Why go for the kids?” she asks, although she’s fairly sure she knows why.
Clint shrugs like he doesn’t know, although Melinda knows that he does too. “Dunno, just thought… If the robber went for ‘em, I better go for ‘em too, you know?” he slurs, and Melinda smiles.
She’s one of the privileged few to know that he’s married. Has been for a couple of years already. It was part of their agreement of him joining SHIELD. That nobody but Fury, Phil, Maria and herself knew. That was it.
Well, them and Peggy, but Peggy knew everything about everyone at SHIELD anyway.
“Medic says you’re not traveling anywhere until you’ve healed up,” she says, and Clint makes a face that’s worse than the one he made when he stood up, fresh bullet wound to the gut.
“Aww, Melinda! I promised Laura I’d bring her some souvenirs from Colorado!” he says, and Melinda shakes her head.
“I’ll make the call, don’t you worry, I’ll take the heat.”


DATE: Christmas 2016
LOCATION: New York City, New York, United States of America
(Timeline: Post-Age of Ultron)

“The presents are here!”
The kids’ heads jerk upright as soon as the front door closes, and it takes them about two and a half seconds before they’re barrelling towards Kate, who has a handful of bigger than life presents stuck between her arms.
“What did-”
“Did Uncle Tony-”
“Waaaah?”
Laura walks over with Nathaniel in her arms, and puts him down on the cotton blanket she’s put out on the wooden floors of the flat. He flops down to a sitting position, and immediately puts his fingers into his mouth in a valiant attempt to fit his entire fist in there. Laura grabs one of the bigger presents before it falls out of Kate’s arms.
“Woah, I told him, no presents that can’t fit in a bag!” Laura mutters, but Cooper’s already grabbing for one of the bigger ones too, and Lila is helping Kate carry everything safely towards the Christmas tree.
It’s a huge tree - they went to choose it from the salesman down on the street, and they’d all given a hand in carrying it up all the way to the 9th floor. Bed Stuy is still a pretty amazing area, Laura knows, but she doesn’t miss the stairs. At all. Carrying a toddler as well as a stinging tree up some stairs is not the best way to spend your day.
They had all lost it when reaching one of the corners Kate had yelled out for them to “PIVOT!!!!” in a strangled, gargled voice, which reminded all of them of the Friends episode where they moved a couch around.
There are a couple of presents underneath it already, although Nathaniel has tried to grab them, one after the other, in spite of being told repeatedly no. Thankfully, he’s more interested in the wrapping paper than the actual contents, so, to make sure he stays out of the stash, Laura has begun to wrap random items and give them to Nathaniel whenever he seems to have an interest in them again. He’s gotten an avocado, an empty shoe box and one of Clint’s unwashed sweaters so far, and she’s also wrapped up a plastic bag, as well as a bouncy ball. You never know, right?
They’ve all been working hard to color code the tree too - it’s gold and purple. Only two colors, they’d decided, because too many colors wasn’t pretty, Lila had decided. She remembers the failure of the blues, greens, yellows and reds on the tree last year, and she is absolutely certain that she won’t have it repeat this year again. And, of course, purple, because of their dad. They’d gone around most convenience stores asking around for purple Christmas tree decorations, and had finally ended up in a little side shop which sold packages in all different colors.
The flat is entirely decorated in the two colors. Laura is very proud of her, for once, and she hopes that Clint will enjoy it when he comes home. Ever since Loki happened, they’ve banned the color silver and grey from the holiday decorations, because she knows that it triggers him, even though he never tells. He’ll spend too long in the bathroom, though, trying to pretend that it’s okay. She knows him, though, by now. They’ve been married over two decades, and she knows how Clint works. So he won’t get the opportunity to do it this year, because it’s gold and purple. Everywhere.
Laura feels her phone vibrating as she puts down the big, green present that the courrier just delivered for Tony, and when she sees Clint’s cell number, she frowns. He’s supposed to be on the plane to New York by now, how can he still have service if he’s in the air?
Pressing down on the green button, Laura answers. “Hey!”
“Hey, Laura! Woah, that’s a lot of noise,” is the first thing Clint says as the line connects, just as Cooper bangs one of the presents into the table and drops it onto the floor. Thankfully, nothing sounds broken when he shakes it vividly afterwards, and his face loses the panicked glare it had gotten as he did.
“How come you aren’t on your flight?” Laura asks, as Kate signs to her to put on the loudspeaker. Laura presses the button down and Clint’s voice fills the room as he speaks again.
“Well, you know how it’s snowing in New York, right now?” he says, and at the sound of his voice, Nathaniel loses interest in the formerly giftwrapped avocado and pushes himself to all fours, in order to crawl closer to his mom, and thus, his dad. There’s a slight pause before Clint goes on. “Well, it would seem that London’s catching a bit of it too, and they’ve canceled all flights out because of the heavy snowfall.”
Cooper groans, Lila huffs, Kate growls and Nathaniel makes a bleeping noise as the information registers in Laura’s head. “Wait wha-”
“I think half the entire planet is stuck in the airport with me,” Clint continues, and Laura can almost hear and see the sigh and frown he’s got on his face, because Clint hates airports. He hates flying commercial, he hates the lines to get on and off the plane, he hates those people who can’t figure out that a carry on is supposed to fit in the overhead compartments, he hates it with his entire being and now he’s stuck with what amounts to a shit ton of people who aren’t used to travelling via airplane.
He grumbles something unintelligible, as Cooper walks over to the phone, cupping his mouth to enhance his voice: “You’re not coming for Christmas?” Cooper practically yells, and Laura extends her hand so Cooper can hear his dad’s answer.
“Nah, bud, I don’t think so. I’ve pulled the SHIELD card and everything at the desk, but it would seem that when they cancel three out of four flights, it’s not a question of money or priorities anymore…”
He sighs, loudly, loudly enough that Cooper hears it and huffs back at it. “But you haven’t been home for Christmas in years!” he says, and Laura makes a grimace.
“He knows, buddy, he knows,” Laura tries, but that’s when Kate decides to chime in, putting her hands down on Lila’s shoulders as if to make a point.
“Well, I don’t care if he’s not here, we can do Christmas when he does get here! Turkey’s not cooked and presents aren’t unwrapped, and you guys are still off school until sometime in January, right?” she says, and Laura actually thanks every single God she can think of that her little sister isn’t making the situation any messier than it has to be.
Lila makes a whiny noise, though. “But it’s not the same if it’s not on the same day as everyone else!” she says, and Clint makes a noise that Laura interprets as agreement.
“I mean, I could- I could ask Stark to-”
“You are not bringing that man into Christmas any more than he already is!” Laura interrupts, exchanging an amused glance with Kate, looking over at the presents. “He’ll bring home something from every country in Europe, and we already have a souvenir room back home that doesn’t have room for any more chachkis than those you bring home from all over the world.”
Laura pulls the phone back to her ear and removes the loudspeaker so it’s just her and Clint talking now. “Just- make it home whenever you can, yeah? Maybe tell- maybe tell the lady at the front desk that you’re an Avenger?”
Clint laughs into the phone, and Laura realizes how much she’s missed him. He’d gone on a mission to Amsterdam, flying commercial for subtlety reasons, and he’d promised he’s make it home in time this year. “I already tried that, but it’s like the Starbucks discount card- nobody believes it because I’m officially not a recognized Avenger. Had I been with Steve or Tony, however-”
“Different story, I know,” Laura completes, and sighs, as she turns around to look through the window. Snow is falling in New York as well, and she can’t help but remember the times him and her were walking through Central Park as the wonderland had just settled in the early hours of Christmas morning, all those years ago.
“Just make it home, okay? No injuries, no fights, nothing- a plane cancellation, I can live with,” Laura says into the phone, quietly.
She can practically hear Clint nodding into the phone. “Yes, ma’am,” he replies, before adding a quick, “I love you, I miss you,” before hanging up.
She holds the phone down from her ear, and takes a couple of seconds to watch the snow falling. The sounds around her fade out and disappear, as she remembers her first Christmas with Clint, in this same flat, except it didn’t have all of these things on the walls, nor did it feel like a home, and it had just been shot to hell because of a shootout that almost left Clint more dead than alive.
Nathaniel’s wail brings her out of her appreciation, and turning around, she smiles at her youngest, whose hands seem to be grabbing out for the phone, and for his dad. She walks over to him and bends forward, before sitting down on her ass in front of him. “Daddy’s coming home soon, okay? He’ll be home soon,” she whispers, as she lifts Nathaniel up and places him on her lap, stroking his hair back as she kisses his forehead.


DATE: Christmas 2010
LOCATION: Somewhere in Greenland, Greenland, Kingdom of Denmark
(Timeline: Pre-Avengers Assemble (2012))

It's been a long couple of days. Mostly because they both know it's Christmas, and that there's nobody else around them but them. The two of them.
Clint's been in Greenland for a couple of months now, patroling the icy wide scopes in the hopes of finding the Valkyrie – Nick Fury had been in Greenland a year before him, and all they had found were HYDRA marked weapons, before Nick had been needed back on the mainland again.
When he'd left home, Clint had promised Laura that he would try and make it home for Christmas, in spite of the hard, factual statistics that said that none of the men patrolling Greenland made it home for Christmas. They all held it together, as one big group, and all saw their families when they made it home later on, when their patroling duties were done and over with.
He wasn't sure where they would be, and had hoped that he would be able to make at least one phone call home.
But not so much this time.
They're freezing their asses off – late December, on a sled pulled by some dogs, with nothing else but some insulated fabric, some goretex and a little bit of Inuit clothing to keep them warm... It's not something he'd recommend to anybody.
The fact that he's sharing a cup of coffee made from instant coffee, provided by military personnel before they left, makes it a bit better though. ”You ever miss Christmas?” Clint asks, and his partner nods.
”This is third time, now,” he replies, with a strong accent, and Clint purses his lips in understanding. ”We go for two years, yes? So two years, I did not spend Christmas with my wife.”
”Talk about it, I've been missing it every now and then for the past ten years...” Clint grumbles into the stainless steel mug that's dented from where it impacted as the sled lost its footing a couple of weeks before. ”Your wife- she ever mad at you that you keep missing Christmas?” he asks, though, and Clint's partner shrugs, nonchalantly.
”I think so, but she does not say it. She is happy to see me when I come home, so I cannot complain.” He pauses, before smiling. ”Last time she said, here is a late Christmas present, when I came home, and handed me my daughter for the first time.”
Clint smiles, his entire face lighting up. Cooper's older now, close to being a teenager, and Lila is just getting over her 'what is this' phase, but he loves them both dearly. He'd missed their first Christmas together, but Barney had reassured him that 'don't worry, Lila won't even remember her first Christmas anyway', and that had helped Clint find peace with himself upon missing Christmas.
”I have two kids,” Clint says, and his partner nods. ”Oldest one is eleven, and the youngest is eight. They're absolutely wonderful, and I love them with all my heart,” he says, and it feels so true – he hasn't felt this way in a long time – there are days where he would just wish the kids would shut the hell up, and then there are days where he just wants to listen to their banter because it is something so many people just take for granted.
Both his kids are older now, though, and so he knows they'll remember him not being here. Instead of being home, with his family, he's stuck here. With his partner. Clint lifts his mug, and his partner does the same. ”Happy Christmas,” they say in chorus, before taking the hot beverage up to their lips.
Clint's become quite familiar with the routine – it doesn't change much out here, except that they rotate days on who sets up the tent, who fetches ice for water, who takes care of the dogs, and so on and so forth. He misses home, though. Oh so very much. He misses home like he never has – maybe it's the fact that Greenland is such a barren wasteland, but all he wants to do is come back home. To the noise, to the sounds, to the grumbly neighbors and the annoying boss who wants him to do paperwork all the time. Up here, it sounds like he's got his aids off at all times, and even when he's wearing them, he's not sure he can hear things or not.
Except for the dogs howling, every now and then, though. They'll see the moon, shining and bright in the sky, and their instincts will kick in.
Clint would be lying if he said he didn't join in on the howling too, and his military partner does it too.
(It's not something he would ever admit to others, though. Well. Maybe Barney, because Barney would understand.)


DATE: Christmas 2013
LOCATION: Triskelion, Washington DC, United States of America
(Timeline: Post Avengers: Assemble)

Maria Hill knows better than to stand in the way of an angry mother. She knows better because she has been on the receiving end of that earful, and there is nothing more in this world she wants than avoid a scolding by none other than Laura Barton.
So, instead of stopping Laura when she bursts through security using Clint's identification and password, access code and all, Maria just makes it her mission to follow her to her final destination, which she's 99% sure is Nick Fury's head office in the Triskelion. Otherwise Laura wouldn't be here.
Maria knows exactly why: It's December, and Clint still hasn't made it home for longer periods of time since Romanoff knocked him back to his senses, and if there's anything that Laura loves, is spending time with her husband. Psychiatrists and other medical personnel keep insisting on the fact that Clint isn't better, he isn't well enough to go home, and letting him go home would compromise not only SHIELD, but his private life as well. Nobody knows he's got a wife and some kids hidden away in Iowa. Nobody except Nick and herself, now. Phil, knew. But Phil's gone.
Maria bites her lip, as she follows the trail left behind by Hawkeye's wife, biting her lip at the mess she's making. She should know better. Barging through doors brandishing an ID Maria is pretty sure Laura should not be able to have. Who's to say what Clint and Laura share, though.
They make it up the last elevator, Maria using her Clearance level 8 badge to gain them access, and before Maria manages to say a single word, Laura puts up her finger, leaves her in the elevator and walks over to Nick Fury's office door. She knocks, but she doesn't wait for permission before she opens it, and as soon as she's through, Maria can hear her. The words get clearer as Maria follows her inside.
”You're going to keep him over Christmas?” Laura is yelling, and Maria would like to see this without being an active participant, but suddenly Laura is pointing at her.
”Maria here has been following me around, until I made it here, and she hasn't said a single word about Clint! Nothing! Not a single-”
”In my defense, you kept shushing me-”
”Shut up, Maria, this isn't about you right now. Clint saved the world, okay, Nick? He saved the world and nobody knows the price he paid for that – sure everybody knows that Tony went through that stupid wormhole because you idiots sent a missile towards New York, every single person knows it, but nobody ever talks about what Clint did! What he was forced to do! So you will tell me, Nick, and you will tell me today. Are you keeping my husband from going home over Christmas?”
As much as Maria knows Laura can scream and yell and rage, the same way Clint sometimes loses it when he's really angry, Laura isn't screaming now. She's cold, she's fierce and she is protective. Most of all, though, she is right. Everyone knows Phil Coulson died, stabbed in the chest by Loki, as he tried to protect Thor. Everyone knows that Tony Stark practically sacrificed himself to keep a bomb from blowing up Manhattan and New York. Everybody knows that Thor got stabbed on the top of Avengers tower, and everybody knows that it was Natasha Romanoff who managed to close the portal, by using Loki's scepter to do so.
Nobody knows who the hell the archer guy was, nor what he brought to the fight other than apparently crashing a quinjet in the middle of the street and making sure that Captain America showed up for the fight. That's it.
There are a quiet couple of seconds where Nick considers Laura in from of him. Maria has seen him do this before – like a fighter, sizing up his opponent, he does this when someone hostile barges into his office to discuss tactics, missions and other things. Brock Rumlow is one of those guys who get the treatment most often. This time, however, Nick Fury decides not to chew Laura out.
”I am keeping him from coming home for Christmas,” Nick starts, quietly, but firmly. At first, Maria thinks Laura is going to interrupt, but she doesn't and allows Nick to finish his sentence. ”Pierce, myself and others,” he says looking over at Maria, who looks straight at Laura's face when she turns around to glare at her, ”believe that Clint is still not in a condition that allows us to clear him to go home, yet. Natasha is training with him every single day to make sure that there are no underlying side-effects from Loki's mind control, but you know this, Laura. He was gone for weeks. He barely talks about what Loki made him do, or what he did, voluntarily, to avoid Loki's wrath.”
Nick pauses. Maria has seen him shred people to nothing with that glare, but Laura holds it steady – it will take more than that to break her spirit. And if she's here, if she's standing in Fury's office, Maria knows it's important to her to hear it from the boss.
Laura inhales, before she speaks, quietly. ”Is he a threat to our children?”
Nick doesn't blink, doesn't hesitate, doesn't even think about it before he nods. ”He is a threat to Natasha Romanoff and Brock Rumlow, so he is a threat to your children, Laura. I'm sorry, but I cannot allow him clearance to go home over the holidays.”
Maria feels the tension drop immediately, and when Laura finally sighs, restraining herself from letting her true worry shine through, she feels for her. Clint's been in a shitty situation, and Maria wishes she could do more. She wishes she could do more for her, for Clint, for the kids. But she can't. Not anymore than what she already has.
And she's truly sorry about it.


DATE: Christmas 2015
LOCATION: Waverly, Iowa, United States of America
(Timeline: Post Avengers: Age of Ultron)

He's been talking for the entire ride over. They had made it to Des Moines by way of Stark's private airplanes, and had decided to rent a car there. They weren't supposed to be here, see.
Clint was on a mission until mid-January, sorting out some of the Wakandian Vibranium black market leftovers from the Johannesburg mess, and he had been doing just that. Killing the top man, and the second in command, until the third man came into the picture and realized that it would just fuck up politics in the country if they kept doing it.
And he'd come back to base earlier, smelling of kerosene, sweat, blood and dust. He had barely had the time to put down his suitcase, before he'd burst into Wanda's room, interrupting a conversation with Vision, and asked her if she wanted to see what a real family Christmas was like.
She had held out her powers to read his mind and see if he had lost it, but she'd been met with pictures of Christmas markets, hand in hand, and Christmas presents, Christmas shopping and she hadn't been able to say no.
So here they are, on the driveway up to his farm. She's never been here before, not yet. She's heard a lot about them, and she knows that Clint and Laura have agreed to name their yet unborn baby after Pietro. It's something she wishes they wouldn't do, because it would keep her sorrow for Pietro kicking, but knowing that Clint appreciated her and her brother as much as he did... Well, it meant a lot more.
As Clint turns onto a side road, that's barely been cleared for snow, her hand flies to the handle above her head and he laughs. He's been all smiling, all happiness, and just radiating joy for the past 48 hours he's been home, and she can't wait to see the reaction from the other family members when he surprises them. Clint has told Wanda that there might be some people she doesn't know there, family and everything, but she's said that it'd be okay. It's not a problem.
Clint turns off the headlights at left hand turn, and he guides them through the road by having a look on the GPS, but she suspects that he's just doing this to reassure her. She can feel it in him that he knows this road intimately, and he would be able to drive it whilst blind.
They park, they close the doors without slamming them and revealing their location. Clint flicks off a security system on the porch by pressing four buttons, and walks up onto the porch, kicking the snow off his boots as he does so. She imitates him, and takes a deep breath as his hand shoots up to the front door and knocks.
Everything grows quiet behind the door, the music even stops, and before she knows it, light blinds her from inside and shrilling children noises drown out every single thing around her. She hasn't even been here for three seconds, but the pure love, the pure unrequited familial love pouring out of every single soul present?
She hasn't felt this in years, and she knows Clint hasn't either.