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If anyone would ask Yelena now why she is behaving like the biggest idiot on earth, scaling a wall in pouring rain in the middle of the night, she couldn’t answer them. Every bone in her body aches, she can’t remember the last time she slept, and her soul is so very tired that she almost regrets not having taken up her father on his offer to return home with him. It was tempting, of course, to hide away with him for a while to lick her wounds and perhaps drown her fresh horrors in vodka—Valentina, Bob, herself. But no, there’s something she has to do first, someone she must see, no matter that she’s already slipped three times on the same ledge and the rain has soaked through her clothes and shoes.
She could feel this incessant yearning worm its way into every crevice of her brain ever since meeting Walker and Ava in that secret warehouse. It fueled her will to fight, her will to survive—the single thought of It cannot end here. I have to see her again. I have to. I have to. I have to.
When they realized who Bob really was and what he was capable of, Yelena could barely breathe through the sudden onslaught of dread. How far did Bob’s power reach? How many people could he make disappear in the void without Yelena’s knowledge? Would he be like Thanos and steal another good-bye from her?
Her heart beats a frantic rhythm against her ribs and not because she lost her grip again. It’s the very real chance that she will find the apartment dark and still at the top of this fucking wall that has her stomach flipping and her pulse racing. It’s that fear that at last allows Yelena to pull herself up the last edge and crouch on the narrow windowsill. Rain is peltering against the pane, creating surreal paintings with reflections of nearby streetlights. It’s impossible to look inside, impossible to glimpse behind the distorted version of her own pale face staring back at her. But she has to know. She has to. Despite her shaking hands, it is just as easy as the first time to unhook the window latch and slide it open. She slips inside without making a sound and is greeted by the exact eerie, dark stillness she feared to find.
No dog rushes at her from the couch. No bottle of hot sauce is chucked at her face. Yelena stares into the shadows, unblinking and willing them to move by sheer force of will. As the seconds tick by without anything happening, numbness spreads through her that has nothing to do with the rain or cold. The longer everything around her remains silent, the more does Yelena’s fragile grip on herself slip. The louder does the voice in her head scream that she’s only ever getting close to everything she always wanted but can never have it—it’s Ohio and the Blip and losing Natasha all over again and her knees begin to tremble the same moment as her bottom lip.
“Kate Bishop…”
She never thought a name could ever sound so much like a whimper, a plea and an apology all wrapped into one. Whatever it is, it remains unanswered, and Yelena realizes with gut-wrenching, heartbreaking clarity that she is too late. Kate is gone. Sucked into the void. Taken from her by Bob in a cruel act of finality even worse than the Blip. How could she let this happen again? How did she forget to make sure Kate was okay before that last confrontation with Bob? How is she supposed to carry on without the daily pictures of Lucky and memes about the Avengers and Kate’s endless, silly texts? Tears prick in the corners of her eyes. Her heart sits wet with longing and grief in her chest.
“Kate…”
“Yelena?”
A small light is switched on, bathing the couch in a warm glow where Kate sits up. Her hair is messy, and she is rubbing sleep from her eyes like she just woke up and the relief slams so hard into Yelena she’s getting whiplash. She’s too choked-up for any kind of response bar a strangled sob. Not a second later, Kate moves, her naked feet not making a sound on the tiles as she comes closer. Yelena can’t do anything than stare at her face, the concern etched into the crease between her brows, the quiet intensity in her blue eyes.
“I saw you on the news today, are you okay?”
Yelena’s mouth twitches but no words come out. What is she even supposed to say when she has no concept of how okay even feels like? What is she supposed to do when she faced her worst self in the Void and still it doesn’t even compare to the idea of having lost Kate. Whatever okay looks like, Yelena is not it. Yelena is twenty years of repressed trauma and depression and self-loathing and this close to collapse from how much she hurts.
Kate is already reaching out to her when Yelena throws herself into her arms. She hasn’t cried since last visiting Natasha’s grave, and she isn’t one for hugs but tonight she is doing a lot of things she usually never does. She buries her face in the warm crook of Kate’s neck and her fingers curl so tightly in the soft cotton of her shirt that she’ll leave marks like from claws in it. And when Kate hugs her back just as fiercely, the tears come hot and heavy, like a dam that suddenly breaks.
“Alright, that was a dumb question, I’m sorry,” Kate murmurs into her hair while she cradles Yelena against her chest like something precious. “But I’m glad you came here.”
Yelena is glad too, even though she can’t articulate that in any way right now while crying her heart out, overwhelmed by too many emotions all pulling her in different directions. All she is capable of is clinging to Kate like her life depends on it. It doesn’t sound like she is crying quite yet but Kate’s voice has that watery edge to it like perhaps she’s been scared of something, too.
“I came back a day late from my business trip to L.A. and was stuck at the airport when that guy crashed Stark Tower.” Kate’s breath hitches and Yelena would do anything to soother her pain. “At first, I was so angry that I couldn’t be there to help but then I saw you and the others and…”
A full-body shudder wracks Kate’s tall frame and Yelena does the only thing she can think of that might calm her down and nuzzles her neck with her nose. In return, Kate’s arms wrap tighter around her to the point where it would have suffocated her if this was anyone else. Not Kate, though. Kate’s arms are no cage, but the only place Yelena feels like she isn’t going to come apart at the seams.
“When I saw you step into that black… nothingness… I was so scared,” Kate mumbles. “I thought I would never see you again. That I’d never get to say all those things I’ve been meaning to say.”
It’s comforting in a terrible, terrible way to hear Kate confess Yelena’s own fears to her. Perhaps that is how Yelena manages to stop sobbing and lower herself back onto her wet feet. She doesn’t go very far because she is nearly convinced that Kate’s embrace is all that is holding her together. Slowly she retreats one arm from around Kate’s broad shoulders and presses her palm against her cheek. Her skin is warm under Yelena’s cold fingers and her eyes of the darkest blue, like a stormy ocean, as they search Yelena’s face.
“Then we are the same, Kate Bishop.”
“Is that so?” Kate sighs and leans harder into Yelena’s touch. It makes her want to weep all over again.
“Yes.” She can’t say where all this honesty is coming from or the bravery to bear her softest parts to Kate’s after hiding them for so long. Perhaps fighting a god-like super-villain and surviving to tell the story does that to someone. “I came here tonight because I thought the Void had gotten you, too.”
Yelena runs her thumb over the curve of Kate’s cheekbone and watches how Kate’s pupils dilate. It causes a pleasant warmth to pool behind Yelena’s navel and her voice comes out hoarse when she speaks again. “I was terrified because I didn’t know how to live with the loss of you. I couldn’t.”
Kate brings one hand up to clasp her fingers around Yelena’s wrist, not tight in any way, not like a chain but to ground. To connect. Her voice is barely above a murmur, brimming with a dozen questions, Yelena doesn’t know how to answer.
“Yelena…”
They are so perfectly tangled into each that all it would take to close the final gap between them is for Kate to dip her head down. It’s so easy, such a small, silly move. And yet, Yelena knows like she knows her parents love and her grief over Natasha that Kate would never breach that last line. And somewhere in her hurting, battered, torn-up mind Yelena knows this is a bad, very bad idea. But when has she has ever been known for having good ideas?
The next moment she grabs a fistful of Kate’s shirt and pulls her down into a searing kiss. It’s not sweet or romantic or all those things literature and film tell you about first kisses. It’s greedy and a bit selfish and Yelena is gasping from how much she wants. She drinks in the small noises of pleasure coming from Kate like she’s been starving for it and applies more pressure. She opens her mouth to slide her tongue over Kate’s bottom lip, pleased with the groan it draws from Kate. Pleased with the pain and trauma sliding further from her mind with every brush of their lips. There’s only Kate. Holding her close. Settling her thumb against the corner of Yelena’s jaw to tilt her head and deepen the kiss. Making her feel with an intensity that is startling.
Yelena finds that she doesn’t give a damn whether this is a bad idea and slides her fingers into Kate’s thick, dark hair to scratch her blunt nails over her scalp. Kate’s mouth falls open in a guttural groan. Yelena licks into her shamelessly. Their tongues meet.
New desire surges through her that knocks whatever air is left in her lungs out. It wants to be satisfied and the only one who can do so is Kate. Keeping one hand in Kate’s hair she uses the other one to frantically pull at the string holding Kate’s pants up. It comes apart easily and Yelena hooks her fingers into the waistband, desperate to be touched by Kate, desperate to have her inside her, desperate to be wanted.
“Whoa,” suddenly Kate stumbles a step back, eyes wide and vulnerable. “Slow down a moment.”
Yelena’s chest is heaving, she can still taste Kate on her tongue and yet all the happy, ecstatic feelings are already turning to ash. Could she really have read the situation so wrong? She takes a step forward back into Kate’s personal space and juts her chin out.
“Why? Does kissing me not feel good?”
“Wha—? That is not what—” Kate grimaces as a blush colors her cheeks a pretty pink. “It’s amazing. Like, really, really amazing.”
There, her gaze briefly flicks away, and her expression turns from sheer embarrassment to sheepish, like maybe she feels caught. The smile around her lips is small, a bit self-deprecating and Yelena finds it altogether way too charming. Kate swallows and tangles their hands together.
“Actually, I’ve been wanting to do this for months.”
Yelena frowns but allows Kate to pull her closer again. “Months? We barely know each other for a year.”
“Yeah… I know.” Kate’s smile wobbles and she hides it by lifting Yelena’s hand to her mouth to brush featherlight kisses against her knuckles. “Pretty lame, huh?”
“No, Kate Bishop, not at all,” Yelena whispers between elation and confusion. “But if that is the truth, why do you want to stop?”
Kate sighs, not in annoyance, not quite resignation either but perhaps in the believe that she’s doing the right thing. “I don’t want to, believe me but… you’ve been through a lot today. And though I don’t know what exactly happened, I can see that you’re hurting, and I guess…” She stalls and apprehension creeps into the blue of her eyes until they’re a muddled grey. Yelena cups her cheek again, hoping to soothe, wanting to comfort, without having any idea how that looks like. It seems to work either way because Kate’s gaze clears again, and her voice is steady and sure.
“I don’t want our first time to be a trauma-response.”
Yelena freezes. It should frighten her how easily Kate unraveled her, how she can peel back the many layers of Yelena’s self-delusions without having to try all that hard. To be seen for what she really is—the lonely, hurting girl that grew into a lonely hurting woman—should be scarier than any rooftop jump or standing up against a god. But Kate doesn’t turn away from her in disgust or boredom. She kisses her palm in a display of such sweet intimacy that Yelena’s heartbeat jumps out of control.
“I think… that I deserve better than that. And so do you.”
Yelena can’t help herself and leans up to press a soft kiss against Kate’s mouth.
“Sometimes I forget how smart you are and then you go ahead and say such things.”
“Mhm,” Kate hums against her lips, “You should see me in a boardroom. It’s only around you that my brain doesn’t work properly.” Kate covers her mouth properly and Yelena grows weak in the knees for entirely different reasons than fear or exhaustion. “Must be your face.” Kate kisses her way along her jaw. “And your accent.” She leaves a kiss on the soft skin behind Yelena’s ear. “And that you’re a little bit mean.”
“Idiot,” Yelena sighs nearly breathless and pulls Kate’s head back by winding a hand into her hair. If they keep this up, if Kate keeps looking at her with all that affection shining in her eyes, there is no guarantee that she can keep her hands off of her. So, Yelena takes a deep breath and lays her desire to rest for another night and asks, “Do you maybe want me to tell you what exactly happened?”
“I would like that very much,” Kate says before she must stifle a yawn. “But can you tell me in bed? It’s like, three in the morning and you’re dripping all over my floor.”
Yelena makes quick work of getting out of her sopping wet suit and boots. Now that her fears are soothed and there is time to heal in the days and weeks to come, a bone-deep exhaustion settles into her. With a tired but genuine smile, she takes Kate’s hand and leads her to the bedroom.
“Say, what do you know about genetically enhanced guinea pigs?”