Fury's Fruities

Chapter: Twenty Seven

Everyone went straight to bed after dinner. Nick had made some kind of turkey platter which made everyone tired. Yelena slept in her room with Melina, once the woman had confirmed that nothing inappropriate had ever happened in her bed, so Nat finally got her bed to herself for the first time since the parents arrival. She was exited because sleeping with Yelena is HELL. She sleeps like a young child. Rolling all around, she wakes up every morning on a different side of the bed with her hair a complete mess. Digging her feet underneath the red head, which doesn't hurt to bad the first time but when it's continuously done in the same spot packs a bit of a punch. Talking while she sleeps which sometimes gets creepy, she imagines some weird things. Her loud snores which have woken both Nat and Maria as well as Clint the one time he forgot to turn off his hearing aids before bed. And lastly which in the red head opinion the worst of all, the drooling. Every morning Nat wakes up to wet spots on her pillows and an open mouthed blonde snoring into her face. She's had to wash her pillow cases every day since Melina and Alexi arrived.

Of course the one night she gets her bed to herself she wakes up half way though it. That rock shit really messed her up.

It's the middle of the night when the red head wakes up gasping for air. Great they're back. She though to herself as she tried to even out her breathing. Nightmares. Flashes, sometimes full memories of the red room. She hates it. Having to relive those horrible things. Her first kill. Ruthless training. Dancing till her feet were bleeding and her toenails felt as though they would fall of, which actually happened once. Seduction training. The tortures punishments for making the smallest mistake. They all replay in her head on repeat making her heartbeat faster.

"Hey, are you ok?" Maria asks groggily as she looks at the redhead through squinted eye, having been woken up by the whine the girl had let out before waking up

"Yeah I'm fine." Nat replies as she pushes her head back down into her pillow and hugs her spider stuffed animal tightly

She closes her eyes and tries to force herself back to sleep. It doesn't work. The memories continue to flash behind her closed eyes. As she lies there with her eyes closed, she begins to feel a dip in the bed beside her. She gasps before turning around quickly to find Maria sitting next to her. She lets out a sigh of relief the looks at the clearly tired brunette in question.

"What did we talk about? You're not ok so don't lie about it." Maria reprimands softly

"You said that I didn't have to talk to you about it if I don't want to." Nat defends

"I'm not saying you need to tell me about it. But you need to admit that you're not ok. You're not fine. You wouldn't be on the brink of tears if you were fine."

"Ok, I'm not fine." Nat sighs "I had a nightmare ok? The deadly Black Widow get scared by something that's not even real." she laughs humorlessly

"But that's not true, is it? You don't have to talk to me about it but I have a pretty good idea what your nightmares are about." Maria says making Nat look away "It's ok to dream about the past. Especially a past like you've had. It's a perfectly normal response to trauma. No one expects you to just forget it. And no matter how hard you try you're not going to. What you went through happened and sadly there is nothing you can do to change that. The only thing that you can do is accept it. Acknowledge that you were a victim. The things that you did weren't your fault and I'll tell you that for as long as I have to."

"I'm not a victim. A victim is weak. I'm not weak!" Nat says a bit too loudly for three o clock in the morning

"Victims aren't weak. They're strong, you are strong. You're strong because you survived. You went through hell and made it out on the other side. That alone is admirable. You use the things you were taught by a horrible, human trash of a man, to do good. You saved the other widows. You freed them and gave them a chance to have a life. A real life where they don't have to suffer every day. You saved a countless number of girls from having to ever go through the things you did. You're a hero Nat."