It was a recurring theme around here; going on eight months in, and Kate had come to recognize the patterns. This last round, Vallo had taken nearly everything from her — the man she considered another dad, and the woman she’d fallen so desperately in love with, envisioned a future with. It hurt, tore her heart into tiny pieces and set them on fire. Two of the biggest parts of her life here in Vallo were there one moment, gone the next.
In nearly the same breath — the same day, at least — it had given Yelena and Natasha a house. The house they’d grown up in, if only for those few years they’d escaped the Red Room to live undercover. Yelena was insistent on moving in and even more insistent on Kate moving in with them.
God, she loved them. They really had become her sisters, and she was ridiculously lucky to have them. They had been her safe place to land, no questions asked, so really, how could she say no to living with them when the opportunity presented itself? Sometimes it felt like being close to them was the only reason she could keep moving forward.
The cottage she’d shared with Elsa — for such a brief time, barely a month they’d officially consolidated before Vallo had ripped her away — sat untouched and unoccupied for a while after the disappearance notification. The only time it was entered was when Nat came by to pick up clothes for her a few days after it happened. But now that she was officially relocating, getting her stuff together was necessary. It was time to pack up, and Yelena had come along with her to get everything boxed up and loaded into the truck they’d rented (now that instant portals were no longer an option).
Their home was eerily quiet and still, in a way that made the hair on the back of Kate’s neck prickle. It still smelled like her girlfriend, was still decorated to her tastes, cabinets still stocked with her favorite sweets. Since the day Elsa had moved in here, the place had been full of warmth, full of her presence, but now she was gone, and fuck, Kate could feel it.
She’d left Yelena in the living room to pack away the knick knacks they’d amassed in the last eight months while she worked in the bedroom, filling up a couple of boxes with clothes. She pushed down the flaps of the box she’d just finished off, held them together with one hand, then reached for the packing tape she’d brought with her — only to come up with an empty roll. She sighed.
“‘Lena!” she called out. “Can you bring me more tape?”
“Yep,” Yelena called back in the midst of her share of packing. This was not the time to judge the girl from the amount of throw pillows they had accumulated in here, but she definitely thought it as she struggled to close the box that was fully stuffed with them. She managed to close down the flaps long enough to put down one layer of tape but it wasn’t enough so she placed another. And then a third. Why did anyone ever need this many throw pillows?
Of course, she couldn’t say it aloud not just because Kate was hurting but also because she knew her adoptive mother also kept that many throw pillows and there was no way in hell that Yelena was about to toss them out.
Picking up the tape, she walked over to the bedroom to hand it over to the young woman who had basically become her younger sister.
“Thanks,” Kate muttered, reaching for the tape. “Hold the flaps closed for me?” She stepped back to start peeling a strip of tape, stretching it out an arm’s length before she maneuvered her way around Yelena to put that first layer of tape down. It took a second layer to make sure it was as sealed as possible, but she didn’t want to go too crazy; this was a box that would be opened again as soon as they got it into the house.
“I shouldn’t be too much longer in here,” she assured Yelena with a quick smile. She didn’t want to linger here too long because it was hurting her. She was smiling through it because that was the best way she could think to deal. She had done enough waffling on that front to last her a lifetime. Today, she was determined to just suck it up and push through.
Yelena did as told, keeping silent mostly. Unusually silent for her. But it was to be expected because there was some form of emotional turmoil through both of them even though Kate’s was probably worse (in Yelena’s opinion).
It wasn’t that Yelena didn’t know what to say. You didn’t suck at communication after being a damned spy for so many years. You read people well and knew exactly what to say. But this wasn’t some espionage thing with the Widows and she knew Kate would see right through it anyway, especially when she knew Yelena usually said something sweet and then sour right after it, like the candy.
She opted for distractive talk instead. “So, I had no idea that I left my place directly after Leon and James broke up. Great timing for us. And then Leon was stupid and didn’t listen to me when I said not to call him or check in on him.”
Yeah, admittedly, Yelena being so quiet had Kate a little worried. It wasn’t that she couldn’t be quiet and enjoy it — there were times when Kate was in a chattery mood that she could see Yelena’s tolerance was low — but it was rare. They usually rapidfire bounced off one another while Natasha smiled at them in the background; it was the eldest of the three that was quieter, more thoughtful by far.
But she knew Yelena had been brooding along with her lately. She had been too involved in her own losses to prod, but she’d noticed in an offhand sort of way. Now was basically the perfect time to let the details spill. Kate needed the distraction, and she listened with a furrowed brow while she assembled another box.
“You couldn’t have known if they didn’t tell you, ‘Lena,” was where she started. She didn’t want her sister feeling guilty for something beyond her control. The house had been a kismet thing. “And Leon seems pretty stubborn,” she commented. She wasn’t besties with him, but she knew him via Yelena and Defense a bit. “Is he okay?”
Yelena gave a shrug as she bent down and grabbed something off the floor and tossed it into the new box that Kate had assembled. “He’s fine. He’ll be fine. I told him it was a terrible idea, he said he was going to do it anyway. I said ‘fine, do whatever you want’ and then he said ‘I fucked up’. I told him to come over to my parents’ house because I had found some of the good vodka there.”
Kate pressed her lips together sympathetically. She’d actually never had a tough breakup like that. Her free time outside of training had always been minimal, so any relationship back home had sort of just faded out. Elsa had been her biggest heartbreak so far, and there hadn’t been a breakup. She doubted there would have been if it wasn’t for Vallo’s stupid whims.
“You’re a pretty great friend for that,” she pointed out, opening the bedside drawer to scoop out a couple handfuls of stuff for her box. “Maybe now that he got turned down, he’ll reel back. Did James break up with him? Or was it the other way around?”
Yelena only gave a shrug as a response to that compliment. She definitely thought she was, even though she regularly threatened to use the stone from the Murder Mansion to throw Leon out the window. “He didn’t say. I suspect James did the majority of breaking up if not the entirety of it.”
She paused, watching Kate for a bit, before asking. “Do you want to talk? I know we had our cuddle pile cut short because of the house.”
Kate got that feeling, too. Leon was a lot and seemed epically grumpy at nearly all times. She didn’t think that meant he was bound to be dumped, but everyone had boundaries and tolerances, and maybe they just hadn’t synced up in the end. It sucked, but she knew it happened.
“It was, but that’s okay. I just made Nat cuddle me more,” she replied with a soft smile, dumping another batch of odds and ends into the box. “I’m dealing with it, you know? There’s really nothing else I can do. Vallo took them away, it’s not like they left me. And I’ve still got you which helps a lot.”
“Hmm, don’t say that, Vallo might hear you and make me disappear.” She probably should have meant it as a joke. Maybe it was supposed to be meant as a joke. But the tone of her voice was not exactly amused.
Yelena sighed and reached out for the tape, readying it for Kate as the next box became full as well. “I’d prefer to stay. In a world where there is a Natasha compared to one without her, I’ll take this place any day. Even if it’s absolutely unpredictable.”
Kate smacked Yelena’s shoulder before pushing the full box’s flaps together for her to tape shut. Maybe she was supposed to be joking, but her tone sounded way too dark and Kate didn’t like it. “You’re not funny,” she scolded her. “I’d prefer you stay, too. You better stay. You and Nat both. Don’t leave me alone with Loki.”
Not that she would be stuck with only her Vallo-dad’s lovelorn partner — she knew she could always lean on Wanda or Tony or Pepper, and she’d made friends on Defense. But she craved the kind of closeness she’d found with Natasha and Yelena, and just the thought of losing them, especially so soon after losing Elsa and Mobius, made her heart hurt.
There was a small stuffed… something… nearby. Probably one of the many stuffed animals Kate had made during her brief stint with conjuring stuffed animals. But Yelena grabbed that and tossed it at her face when she got smacked in her shoulder. Though, let’s be real, she did deserve that.
Yelena stepped closer to help tape the box shut as directed. “Is he really that bad? He’s been quiet all this time, probably because he can’t take over Vallo with aliens or anything.” In all honesty, she had heard things that confirmed that, yeah, he really wasn’t that bad, but she had rarely ever spoken to him. Besides, it was a great way to provide distraction for Kate.
Kate looked briefly affronted but only for a moment after the stuffed animal (looked like a mini Lucky, one of many she’d made with her not-really-useless power) was hurled at her, but it didn’t hurt or anything. Fair was fair; she expected Yelena to retaliate when she got smacked.
“No,” she sighed, shrugging her shoulders before heaving the box down onto the floor. “He’s okay. Kind of like a stepdad that you’re used to dealing with, I guess? But it’s hard for me to see him and not think of… Dad. New York. The Chitauri Invasion.”
He was the reason her dad was dead. She didn’t hold it against him, exactly, but it held her back enough that she knew they would never be besties. She’d look out for him because Mobius would have wanted that, and she did feel bad because this was his loss, too. But he had a family who had his back, and she wouldn’t count herself among them.
“Ah.” So much for an appropriate distraction topic. “Yeah, I guess… that would do it.”
Yeah, she was getting depressing here, Kate recognized that. “It’s cool. Let’s just get this stuff out to the truck.” She scooped up the box now at her feet. “I’ll hire someone to come clean later.”
Yelena went for the nearest box and picked it up. If she could, she would snap her fingers to make all the shitty feelings disappear for both Kate and her. Vallo never made anything easy for them despite the hilarity that ensued in this place sometimes. “Love you, Kate,” she said, following her practically-adopted sister.
If it was possible for human beings to melt into a puddle (which, around here, it probably was), Kate would have right then and there. She turned to nudge the front door open with her shoulder, flashing Yelena a big smile. “Love you most, ‘Lena.”