The Demons Won’t Drown || Clint & Steve
thevalueofstrength:
Steve doesn’t move a muscle, watching his friend from the corner of his eye instead. He isn’t fine but the Captain will hardly call him on it when he already looks ready to flee to someplace different. Better to keep the man where he is and get him to calm down than have him run into the night and end up on the short end of trouble.
“I was awake. Just because you’re in bed, doesn’t mean you’re sleeping.” Not hard to believe, though not entirely true. Frankly, he rather be awake than not these days. “Let me get you that toothbrush.”
Slowness allows his movements to be recognized, spaced out, and taken stock of. It’s something he learned around soldiers, when they woke up in the night, and considering what he knows about Clint’s file, he’s got no qualms calling the crying out ‘shell shock’ in his head. They all had been places they would rather not be, and who’s to say that any of them wouldn’t be in a similar spot some nights?
Quietly, he goes and returns, offering a toothbrush in a box and a resort style toothpaste to Barton. It’s from a survival bag in his closet, but how hard were these things to come by, really? Every Tom, Dick, and Harry seemed to have some sort of contraption or online store these days that sold soaps or pastes or something he could use in a pinch. This was just the tip of the iceberg, really, on what he had stashed in his apartment.
“Besides, it’s early enough that a cup of coffee wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
Still projecting his movements, the Captain just nods from the doorway and moves back, stepping light into the kitchen area. He allows the other to follow or not, giving the archer some space so that he can clean himself up. The bathroom is far too small, anyways, for the both of them and he didn’t particularly feel like blocking the door with his tall frame. It isn’t until he hears a small noise behind him that he acknowledges that he’s not home alone, flipping on the coffee maker with a beep, having loaded it in the meantime.
“It’s not the best drink in the world, but it’ll do,” he murmurs, rubbing a hand through already spiked hair. “Been awhile since I was moving around this early. You don’t seem like you’re entirely used to it either, huh?”
The time in which Steve walked away and returned felt like a fraction of a second-- Clint head being spacey and so consumed with jumbled thoughts that he was heavily displaced. Turning, the archer accepted the packaged toothbrush and toothpaste, eager to get the bad taste out of his mouth. Coffee sounded good, especially with his refusal to go back to sleep. It would have to be black, and strong enough to give a bitter burn all the way to the pit of his stomach.
After freshening up and looking somewhat better than he was, Clint followed Steve into the kitchen and took a seat at the dining table. His arms came to rest atop it, one hand propping up his head as he watched the captain flip on the coffee maker. “Nah. Always been more of the night owl type with a tendency to sleep in. More things tend to happen at night anyway.” Except recently. He and Steve had been attacked in plain daylight, and even Clint’s confrontation with Loki had been during a time when the sun was still lingering.
But still, he was so tired. Clint had been entirely off his game for the past few days and he knew he was far from his best. Hopefully things stayed tame, because if it came to another battle he wasn’t quite sure he would have it in him to be a reliable fighter. He felt sore, even sickly in the way his muscles ached and his eyes burned. There was a constant throbbing in his head, and he wasn’t sure if it was from the lack of sleep or something else. Recently he just hadn’t felt...right.
At least for now the room wasn’t spinning quite so bad, but that was just another bad sign to add to the rest.
“What are your plans for today?” Clint asked, more in an effort to make small talk as he listened to the coffee being brewed. He wasn’t even sure what he would do himself. Feeling like shit had a way of messing with his usually organized and prepared thoughts. He would have teased Steve, asking if he was going out to grocery shop like a good little house wife, but couldn’t be damned near interested enough to do so.
















