Scarlet Widow One-Shots

Just let me know, I'll be at the door (hoping you come around)

All rights go to olsensbitch on AO3

-0-0-0-

For the longest time, Wanda took pride in being an empath. She remembers wisps of memories from her childhood, memories from when her parents were still alive, the ones she hadn’t repressed. She was always feeling everyone’s emotions. It was hard for her to decipher what she was actually feeling when everyone else’s sentiments were overwhelming her. She could read people’s auras, her sense of intuition was insanely good. After hydra, after her powers, her empathy was naturally amplified. It wasn’t just feeling other people’s feelings anymore. It was more like Wanda was completely taking them on as her own, now. Thinking other people’s thoughts. Seeing other people’s memories, good or bad. Feeling their presence if she was in the same building.

For the longest Natasha could remember, she was trained that emotions were for children. Any response she felt to any situation was negative. Happy, sad, angry, it didn’t matter, she would be compromised. After she had defected from the red room to SHIELD, it was still hard to let that go. It was all Natasha knew. That’s how her brain has been wired from infancy. With the help of Fury, Clint, Laura, and Maria; she was able to break out of the complete emotional numbness that overtook her. Even then, it took a couple years for Natasha to pull herself together.

Natasha stayed with Clint and his Fiancé, at the time, Laura, mostly when she was reintroduced to the United States. Clinton was safe, he had spared her life, even helped her take the red room down. In return, she earned herself a platonic soulmate. It didn’t take long for Natasha to start trusting Laura as well.

Natasha had a particularly difficult time adjusting to normalcy when she realized she wasn’t under anyone’s control anymore. She never knew any different from superiors having jurisdiction over her, like she was an object, because to them, she was.

And the day the realization flooded her, that she was the one in control, she starting spiraling. Natasha was her own authority, she could do whatever it was that she wanted, but she didn’t know how. How was she supposed to know where to begin? She was in a foreign country with no missions for the first time, ever. Well, the country wasn’t exactly foreign. She had lived in Ohio for three years when she was eight but everything was unfamiliar nowadays.

Natasha didn’t know how to take this. She couldn’t. So she didn’t. She quickly became hopeless. And she went a full ten days without leaving her bedroom at Clint’s farmhouse.

On the first day, Clint left Natasha alone. He felt for her, understanding that she needed to put all the pieces of herself back together again. To repair what the red room had stolen from her. The only problem was, she didn’t know what those pieces were. She never had ownership over anything, her personality, her mind, her body. Now, she was a clean slate, she could be anyone she wanted.

The second day, Nat didn’t come out of her room either. Clint was trying to give Natasha space but it was Laura who was worried. Laura was always worried about Natasha, even when the other girl was safe and sound. His fiancé convinced him to go upstairs and check on the red head while they were attempting to make lunch.

And he listened, making his way up the steps cautiously, wary of how the interaction would go.

Clint stepped over to Natasha’s door silently, “Romanoff, you still alive in there?” Silence. He rapped his knuckles on the door. “Natasha, cmon, gimme something.” She didn’t respond but he hadn’t expected her to. “You don’t have to come out or talk, but i would appreciate some form of response. So, i know you’re good? How bout a whistle?”

“No,” Natasha’s raspy, accent laced voice bled through the door. “No whistling.”

“Okay, sure. A knock then?”