Summary: After acting in various genres of films your whole life, you're used to being noticed in public. Just not by her or her daughter.
Word Count: ≈1000
Warnings: none, fluff
Reading time: ≈7 mins
Type: drabble
req: tumblr anon
You were no stranger to people approaching you in the streets, asking for pictures and hugs and autographs.
Sometimes you could barely walk down the street without someone noticing you. Not to mention the paparazzi.
But there was a certain person you never expected to attract attention from.
You sit down in the usual back booth in your favourite coffee shop, th quiet one on a little side street. One that barely had customers this early in the morning.
Except from another two customers at a table in the corner. A blonde haired woman, and, you assume, her daughter, sharing a plate of toast and a bowl of fruit.
You yawn slightly, ordering a coffee from the nearby waitress. The young girl glances over her mother's shoulder at you, maybe recognising your voice.
You'd acted in a little of everything over the years. From kids programmes to action films to horror to tragedy. It was understandable the girl might recognise your voice.
What you didn't expect, was for her to continue staring intently at you long after your coffee arrived.
“Rose, stop staring,” her mother chided, chewing another bite of toast.
“Nuh uh! I know her!” The girl, Rose, whispered like this was a state secret.
“That doesn't mean it polite to stare.”
The woman's voice sounded vaguely familiar to you. Identifiable from somewhere, but you couldn't place your finger on it. You'd met a lot of people with a lot of voices throughout your career.
It wasn't until a few minutes later when the woman sighed, stood up, and approached your booth.
“Hey, I'm really sorry.” She begins, but you interrupt her accidentally as you look up from your phone.
“Holy shit. Sorry— uh...hey. Hi.” You stutter out slightly. So yeah, you've met people. Not Scarlett Johansson. Not even close.
“Hi. My daughter thinks she knows you from somewhere?” She continues. “It's silly, she's probably dreamt it or something, but— actually...you do look familiar.”
“I could say the same about you,” you try for a joke, but it just sounds stupid. Stupid joke.
“Scarlett,” she adds, holding her hand out like she needed an introduction. “Johansson.”
“Y/N. Y/L/N.”
Her eyebrows rose a little, recognition now, maybe. “Ah, that's where she knows you from. You acted in Witch School Dropout, right? My daughter loves that show.”
“Yeah. It was my first acting job.”
“You wouldn't come and say hi to her, would you?” She asks carefully.
“Like you're someone I can just say no to.”
Scarlett laughs softly at that. Not the polished red carpet laugh you’ve heard in interviews. A real one. Slightly surprised. Slightly embarrassed. “Well, that’s a dangerous amount of power to give me this early in the morning.”
You grin a little despite yourself and slide out of the booth with your coffee still in hand. “Guess I’m legally obligated now.”
“Exactly.”
She leads you back toward the small corner table where Rose is very obviously trying to pretend she isn’t watching the entire thing happen.
The second you stop beside the table, Rose’s eyes go huge.
“Oh my God,” she whispers.
“Hi,” you say, crouching slightly so you aren’t towering over her. “Your mum tells me you’ve apparently seen Witch School Dropout.”
Rose gasps like you just confirmed the existence of magic itself. “You’re actually her.”
“That is generally how acting works, yeah.”
Scarlett snorts into her coffee.
Rose looks horrified for a second, like she thinks she’s in trouble for recognizing you, before words start spilling out of her all at once.
“I watched all six seasons and the Halloween special and the movie and the behind-the-scenes thing where you fell off the broom and—”
“Oh no,” you groan immediately, covering your face. “Not the broom video.”
“It was funny!”
“It was humiliating.”
“You cried!”
“I was twelve!”
Scarlett is openly laughing now, one hand half-covering her mouth as she watches the exchange. “There’s a broom video?”
“There shouldn’t be,” you mutter darkly.
Rose beams at you like you’ve personally made her entire year. “You’re my favorite character.”
You place a hand dramatically over your chest. “This is actually devastating for the other actors.”
“She made me watch that show six times,” Scarlett tells you.
“Seven,” Rose corrects.
“Seven,” Scarlett sighs. “I still have the theme song stuck in my head.”
Without warning, Rose starts humming it.
“Oh, absolutely not,” Scarlett says instantly.
You burst out laughing.
And there it is again — that weird disconnect in your brain.
Because Scarlett Johansson should not feel this…normal.
Not sitting in a tiny coffee shop with messy morning hair and stolen pieces of toast from her daughter’s plate. Not laughing so hard at a stupid broom accident that she has to set her coffee down.
But she does.
“You’re younger than I expected,” Scarlett says after a second, looking at you properly now.
You shrug lightly. “Occupational hazard of being a child actor.”
“That bad?”
“You ever have a stranger cry because they watched your character die?”
Scarlett pauses. “…fair point.”
Rose narrows her eyes suddenly. “Wait. Mom, you know her too.”
You blink. Scarlett blinks. “Well,” Scarlett says carefully, “I know of her.”
“No, you got excited.”
“I did not.”
“You said ‘holy shit.’”
You choke on your coffee a little while Scarlett closes her eyes briefly like she’s been betrayed by her own child.
“Oh my God,” you laugh. “You recognized me?”
Scarlett points a finger at you immediately. “In my defense, you were not supposed to be sitting in a random coffee shop at seven in the morning looking like a normal teenager.”
“Rude.”
“It’s true.”
“You literally played Black Widow.”
“And you’re literally the kid from half my daughter’s childhood.”
Rose looks between both of you like she’s witnessing something historic.
“You’re both famous.”
The silence that follows is genuinely painful.
Then you and Scarlett both say, at the exact same time:
“Unfortunately.”
That completely breaks the tension.
Rose giggles so hard she nearly knocks over her orange juice while Scarlett laughs beside her, head dropping slightly forward.
You don’t know why the moment settles somewhere warm in your chest.
Maybe because usually being recognized feels loud. Exhausting. Performative.
But this doesn’t.
This is just a sleepy little coffee shop and a kid excited about a show she loves and Scarlett Johansson stealing strawberries off her daughter’s plate when she thinks nobody notices.
Normal.
Weirdly, wonderfully normal.
Scarlett glances at the untouched seat across from them. “You in a rush?”
You hesitate.
Not really.
“…depends,” you say slowly. “Am I about to get interrogated about broom-related workplace incidents?”
Rose lights up instantly. “YES.”
Scarlett grins over the rim of her coffee. “Then yeah. Probably.”
apparently it got out that scarlett has been stalked by a freak guy from LA since august 2022. the man thinks he’s scarlett’s second child real father. he knows where she lives and she left at her house letters and other items. scarlett and her lawyer asked the court a restrictive order, but they didn’t gave to her.
report and block the guy on his socials profiles and be mindful of putting specific locations of scarlett’s next events, he stalks related fan profiles and fanpages to get as much information to reach her.
im gonna link some useful posts of scarlett’s fanpage about this news and who to report.
article link
main profile of the men other profiles of him and others
what happened to scarlett pt 2 pt 3
be mindful you guys, let’s team up to protect scarlett as much as we can. spread the word and let’s take action to report this man. stay safe out there.
🚨VERY IMPORTANT UPDATE 🚨
scarlett’s publicist is asking fans for HELP. apparently everyone is so worried for this guy and this is getting too serious. people are telling he is now in NEW YORK, so we better move up. he changes his plates, phone numbers, accounts, location and everything to not be found by the police. we have to report him immediately as it’s too much dangerous. please let’s be united to make sure scarlett and her family are safe.
in case you are in new york and see him call the police immediately.
if you see something suspicious on the internet please contact the twitter user “keeping up with scarlett” as she is directly in contact with scarlett publicist, if can’t tell me and i report to the twt account.
keep blocking and report his profiles on every social. (twt, instagram, facebook, tumblr, tik tok etc.)
please he follows her on insta so we can start there to track him down, scarlett deserves better than this. he is currently in the hamptons following his last update.
"She’s like my sister. I’ve known her for 10 years. She’s just one of the smartest people I know. It’s great when someone with a razor-sharp intellect wants to have fun." - Chris Evans about Scarlett Johansson
Summary: Scarlett first meets you on the set of Avengers, recognising you as incredibly mature for your age. Finally, you open up as to why, and she makes sure you spend time being a kid.
Word count: ≈3000
Warnings: mentions of cheating, overdose of alcohol / drugs, children being responsible, swearing
Reading time: ≈12 mins
Req by: Tumblr anon
Type: Oneshot
a/n - tysm for ur kind words!! hope this is ok 💕 (also yes i had just listened to Dollhouse before writing this)
You'd never really understood why your family had so many fans. Sure, on camera they all looked perfect, your mother with her jewels, your father with his suit and your brother with his good looks that made women yell love at him.
People adored them. Wanted to be them.
But as far as you were concerned, your dad hung around with sluts, your mom was an alcoholic and your brother smoked cannabis.
When you were younger, you thought all families were like that. How could they not? Everyone aspired to be like yours. So perfect things must behave perfectly too.
Only now, acting in the industry yourself, do you start to realise how carefully manufactured the whole charade is. How fake everything can be.
By nine, you already knew how to sit quietly through interviews without interrupting adults. You knew how to smile for paparazzi without showing teeth because your publicist once mentioned it photographed “more elegantly.” You knew how to avoid questions about your family by redirecting conversations back toward upcoming projects.
You knew how to make your own dinner when your mom forgot. You knew how to organise publicity. You knew.
Adults call you mature. Producers love you. Journalists adore you.
“You're so well-spoken for your age.”
“You have everything handled, huh?”
“You're incredibly professional!”
You learn quickly that those are the compliments children who behave like adults get. You learn that those are the only praise you get not said for the camera.
So you continue. Helping the directors, lighting crew, sitting still and quiet for hair and makeup. Quiet, polite, easy.
By the time you were cast in a role for Avengers, nobody even blinked when you spent breaks alone reading your script or finding your next audition.
The first time Scarlett Johansson really notices you is in the third week of filming. Most of the cast has crowded around the food, waiting to pick some up, laughing about something Chris Hemsworth said.
Crew members move around easily, carrying lights and equipment while assistants hurry with coffee.
You are tiny compared to the folding chair, that's what Scarlett notices first. Eating a salad while highlighting your script in three different colours. She slows as she walks past. “...how old are you again?”
You look up, smiling at her politely. “Nine.”
Her eyebrows lift. “Nine year olds usually prefer the chicken nuggets ”
“Heavy foods make you sluggish during long filming hours.”
Scarlett stares at you for a second. That sounded less like a child and more like something a forty-year-old actor would say in an interview. “…right,” she replies slowly.
You return to your highlighting after that, as Scarlett walks away looking vaguely unsettled.
After that, she starts noticing things more. How you thank every crew member by name. How you instinctively clean up after adults twice your age. How you never complain, even during fourteen hour filming days. How you flinch whenever someone raises their voice too close.
And the strangest part? Nobody else seems concerned about it.
They praise you constantly.
“She’s so mature.”
“She’s the easiest kid we’ve ever worked with.”
“I forget she’s only nine sometimes.”
Scarlett finds that sentence the worst one. Because she was starting to think maybe people shouldn’t forget.
Between takes, she finds you sat under the staircase, cross-legged with a laptop balanced on your knees. Not playing games, answering emails.
“What are you doing?” she asks cautiously.
“Fixing a scheduling issue.”
“You have scheduling issues?”
You nod. “My dad forgot I have an audition on Thursday.”
“So...your parents aren't handling it?” she asks.
“They're busy.” you reply easily. “My dads on a work conference and my mom's got a meeting.”
You knew what "work conference" and a home "meeting" really meant. A night with another woman, and a date with bottles of wine.
Scarlett leans lightly against the wall nearby. “And you just handle it yourself?”
“Well, yeah.” You finally look up at her like the answer was obvious. “Otherwise things don’t get done.”
There it was again. That horrible little adult sentence in a child’s voice.
Scarlett crouchee slightly instead of towering over you. “You know most kids your age aren’t coordinating their own auditions, right?”
You frown faintly. “The industry kids are.”
“No,” she says gently. “They shouldn’t be.”
Something unreadable crosses your face briefly before disappearing behind practiced calm again. The conversation ends there.
A week later, Scarlett runs into you again. The filming had run late into the evening. Most of the younger actors had already gone home hours ago, but you were still sitting in your chair, reading through tomorrow's lines.
Scarlett drops into the chair beside you with a tired sigh. “You know you can mess around between takes, right?”
You look up from your script. “I am.”
“No, sweetheart,” she says carefully. “I mean actual kid stuff.”
You blink at her. “This is actually kid stuff.”
That answer hurt her more than it should have. She studies you for a moment before speaking again. “What do you do for fun?”
“I like working.”
“No, I mean for fun.”
You silence lasts a little too long. “I organise things sometimes.”
“You organise things,” she repeats carefully.
You nod once. “It's calming.”
“How old were you when you started acting?”
“Three.”
“And before that?”
Another pause. Longer this time. You look back down at your script pages. “I don’t really remember before that.”
Scarlett’s chest tightens painfully.
Because nine-year-olds were supposed to remember playgrounds and cartoons and birthday parties. Not media training. Not scheduling conflicts. Not calorie-conscious lunches.
The thing about being “mature” is that adults only ever seem to like it when it makes their lives easier.
Nobody praises children for being loud or messy or emotional. They praise children who stay quiet. Helpful children. Independent children. Children who never need too much. Children like you.
Scarlett starts seeing it everywhere after that conversation. Once you notice something, you can’t really un-notice it.
Like how nobody ever checks where your guardian is because you always arrive on time anyway. How assistants hand you schedules directly instead of looking for a parent first. How makeup artists talk over your head about industry gossip because they forget you’re a kid halfway through conversations.
And you never correct them. You just sit there calmly in oversized hoodies with your script tucked against your chest like you belong among exhausted adults discussing contracts and PR disasters.
One afternoon Scarlett walks past your trailer and pauses.
The door’s open slightly. Inside, you’re standing on a chair at the tiny kitchenette counter making coffee. Actual coffee.
Scarlett blinks slowly. “…is that yours?”
You glance over calmly. “It’s mostly milk.”
“You’re nine.”
“And a half.”
“That does not help your case.”
You shrug like it’s irrelevant, carefully stirring sugar into the mug. “My mom let me start drinking coffee when I started doing night shoots.”
Scarlett stares at you for a long moment.
Not because of the coffee. Because of the casualness. Like that sentence shouldn’t sound strange. Like being awake filming at three in the morning as a child was normal enough to earn caffeine privileges.
She steps inside the trailer carefully. “What time did you wrap yesterday?”
“Like midnight? But we had promo stuff after.”
“And you’re here already?”
You glance at the microwave clock automatically. “Call time was six.”
Scarlett feels vaguely ill. “You slept six hours.”
“I’ve done less.”
Again. That calm little voice saying deeply concerning things like they’re weather updates.
You take a sip of coffee and immediately grimace because it’s still too hot. Nine. Jesus Christ.
Scarlett leans against the counter. “Do you ever just… take days off?”
You look genuinely confused. “From what?”
“Everything.”
“…why?”
The answer comes so fast and sincere it almost hurts. Scarlett studies your face quietly for a second.
There’s no attitude there. No defensiveness. You honestly don’t understand the question.
Because somewhere along the line, rest stopped existing as something meant for you. That realization sits heavy in her chest all day.
By the end of the week she starts deliberately dragging you into normal conversations whenever she can. Not industry conversations. Kid conversations.
“What cartoons did you watch growing up?”
You shrug. “Didn’t really.”
“What do you mean didn’t really?”
“We mostly watched premieres and award shows.”
Scarlett nearly drives off the road emotionally.
Another time she finds you reorganizing craft services. Not taking snacks. Reorganizing them.
“These should probably be separated,” you explain seriously. “Because the fruit condensation is getting on the packaged stuff.”
“…you know that is not your responsibility, right?”
You glance up. “Nobody else was doing it.”
There it is again.
Nobody else was doing it. So you did. Because apparently that had been your entire childhood. Adults dropping things. You quietly catching them before they hit the ground.
The breaking point comes during a rainy filming day in New Mexico.
A set malfunction delays production for hours, leaving everybody restless and irritated. Most of the cast disappears into trailers or starts messing around somewhere off-set.
Scarlett eventually finds you sitting alone beneath one of the large prop awnings. Not reading this time.
Just sitting there with your knees pulled to your chest staring at the rain. “You okay?” she asks softly.
You nod automatically. Too fast. Scarlett sits beside you anyway. For a while neither of you speaks.
Rain drums softly against the metal roofing overhead while distant crew members shout to each other through the storm.
Finally, quietly, Scarlett says, “You know you don’t always have to pretend you’re fine around me.”
Your shoulders tense immediately. Interesting. You stare ahead at the rain instead. “I’m not pretending.”
Scarlett doesn’t push right away.
“You know,” she says after a moment, “when adults call kids mature, sometimes what they really mean is that the kid learned how not to need anything.”
Silence.
“They need things,” you say quietly.
The words surprise even you slightly. Scarlett turns her head carefully. You’re still staring at the rain.
“My parents,” you explain softly. “They need things all the time.” You swallow hard once. “If my mom’s drinking, somebody has to make sure she eats something first or she gets sick.” Your voice stays strangely calm. Practiced. “And if my dad disappears for a few days everyone gets angry so I usually tell people he’s busy before they can ask questions.”
Scarlett’s chest tightens painfully. You keep talking like you’re reading grocery lists. “And my brother forgets stuff when he’s high, so sometimes I remind him about interviews.”
Nine years old. Managing adults. Managing entire emotional ecosystems inside your house. Scarlett feels sick.
“Nobody likes it when things get difficult,” you admit quietly. “So it’s easier if I just…” You gesture vaguely with one hand. Handle it. Fix it. Disappear into usefulness.
Beside you, Scarlett stays very still for a second because she suddenly understands something awful:
You think love is something you earn by being convenient.
“Oh, sweetheart,” she says softly.
The words nearly break you immediately. Because they sound sad. Not impressed. Not proud. Sad.
Your eyes burn suddenly and unexpectedly. You hate that. You look down quickly before she can notice. Too late.
Scarlett shifts slightly closer, careful not to crowd you. “None of that should’ve been your job.”
You laugh once under your breath. Tiny. Humorless. “But somebody had to do it.”
There it is. The entire problem condensed into six words.
Scarlett exhales slowly through her nose. Then, very gently, “What if you got to be nine for a little while instead?”
You frown faintly. “I am nine.”
“No,” she says softly. “You’re surviving. That’s different.”
The rain continues tapping softly around you. You don’t know what to say to that. Because a horrible part of you thinks if you stop being useful for even one second, everything will collapse.
Scarlett seems to read that across your face somehow. “You know what I think?” she says suddenly.
“What?”
“I think you’ve never had a proper sleepover.”
You blink. “…what?”
“A real one,” Scarlett continues seriously. “Movies. Junk food. Staying up too late. Terrible decisions involving nail polish.”
You stare at her like she’s speaking another language. Scarlett gasps softly. “Oh my God. You haven’t.”
“I’ve been to industry parties.”
“That is the saddest sentence anybody has ever said to me.”
Despite yourself, your mouth twitches slightly. Scarlett notices instantly like she’s won something.“There it is,” she says quietly.
“What?”
“That.” She points gently at your face. “That tiny kid expression you keep hiding.”
Heat crawls into your cheeks immediately. “I don’t hide—”
“You do,” Scarlett says gently. “Constantly.”
You look away. Rainwater runs down the edge of the awning in silver streams beside you. After a long silence, you ask quietly “...what kind of movies?”
Scarlett smiles immediately. You hesitate just long enough for Scarlett’s grin to turn victorious.
“Oh my God,” she says, pointing at you dramatically. “You want to know.”
“I was just asking.”
“Mhm.”
You tuck your knees closer to your chest, trying very hard to look unaffected while rain rattles softly around the awning. “I don’t really watch movies.”
Scarlett presses a hand to her chest like she’s been personally wounded. “You are literally in one.”
“That’s different.”
“It’s deeply not.”
You huff quietly through your nose, but she catches the tiny smile threatening at the corner of your mouth anyway. It only encourages her.
“Okay,” she says, suddenly serious in the way adults get right before making important life decisions. “First of all, animated movies.”
“I’ve seen animated movies.”
“Pixar doesn’t count if you watched them at premieres while networking.”
“…I was not networking.”
“You were probably discussing cinematography with producers.”
You open your mouth. Pause. Scarlett narrows her eyes immediately. “Oh my God.”
“I just said the lighting was technically impressive.”
“You are nine!”
You shrug defensively. “It was.”
Scarlett laughs so hard she has to lean forward slightly, one hand over her face. The sound echoes warmly against the rain. And something strange happens in your chest.
You realize she’s laughing with you. Not at you. Not because you said something polished or clever enough to impress an adult. Just because you’re being a kid. The realization feels unfamiliar enough to almost hurt.
Scarlett recovers after a second, wiping beneath one eye dramatically. “Okay. New plan.”
“What plan?”
“You,” she says firmly, pointing at you again, “are getting a childhood.”
You blink slowly. “That sounds expensive.”
“It probably will be.”
“I don’t think that’s how childhood works.”
“Well clearly nobody explained it properly to you, so now I have to intervene.”
Rain continues pouring beyond the awning in silver sheets. Somewhere in the distance, crew members groan as thunder rolls overhead again.
You glance sideways at her carefully. “Why do you care so much?”
The question slips out before you can stop it. Scarlett’s expression softens immediately.
Because underneath the casual tone, the real question is obvious. Why are you paying attention to me at all?
For a moment she doesn’t answer right away. She just studies your face quietly, like she’s trying to figure out how honest to be. Finally, softly. “Because somebody should’ve sooner.”
Your throat tightens unexpectedly. You look away fast, staring hard at the rain again.
Scarlett notices. She notices everything. But she doesn’t push. Doesn’t make it bigger. She just nudges your sneaker lightly with hers.
“So,” she says lightly instead, “sleepover itinerary.”
“You’re really committed to this.”
“Extremely.”
“What even happens at sleepovers?”
Scarlett looks scandalized. “Okay. Wow. We are starting from nothing.”
You mumble something under your breath.
“What was that?”
“I said I was busy.”
“With what? Taxes?”
“…possibly.”
She groans dramatically again. “No child should say ‘possibly’ to taxes.”
Despite yourself, another laugh slips out quietly. Scarlett catches it instantly, smiling softer this time. “There you are.”
You duck your head immediately, embarrassed by how warm your face suddenly feels. It’s ridiculous, honestly.
You’ve spoken on red carpets in front of hundreds of cameras without panicking. But one actress looking at you gently for too long? Apparently unbearable.
“So,” Scarlett continues casually, like she hasn’t just completely disarmed you emotionally. “Essential sleepover components.” She starts counting on her fingers. “Terrible movies.”
“I like good movies.”
“That attitude is exactly why you need this.”
You roll your eyes slightly.
“Second, junk food.”
“I eat junk food.”
“No,” Scarlett says. “You eat carefully portioned organic snacks handed to you by assistants named Chloe.”
You stare at her. “…you know Chloe?”
“She once tried to give me kale chips and called them fun.”
“…that does sound like Chloe.”
Scarlett nods solemnly. “Exactly.” Another finger. “Nail polish.”
“I’ve had my nails done for premieres.”
“That is styling. Entirely different ecosystem.”
“How?”
“At sleepovers,” Scarlett explains seriously, “the goal is not quality. The goal is chaos.” You snort quietly.
“And lastly,” she says, lowering her hand, “absolutely no responsibilities.”
That one hits differently. Your smile fades a little around the edges before you can stop it.
You shrug, staring at the puddles gathering beneath the rain runoff. “Things kinda fall apart if I don’t handle them.”
“Sweetheart,” Scarlett says gently, “you are not supposed to be load-bearing when you're light enough for me to carry like a sack of potatoes.”
The words land so hard your eyes sting again. You look down quickly before she notices. Too late. Again.
But instead of making a big deal out of it, Scarlett just leans back against the support beam beside you and says casually. “You know what else sleepovers involve?”
You swallow once. “What?”
“Terrible board games.”
“…I do like board games.”
She gasps dramatically. “A breakthrough.”
“I didn’t say I’d go.”
“You’re thinking about it.”
“…maybe.”
Scarlett grins slowly, like the sun finally coming out after weeks of rain.
And for the first time in a very long while, the idea of acting your age doesn’t feel embarrassing. Just possible.
