The Tower: The Queen of Asgard

The Hair Cut

That night we all gathered together for a family meal. Wanda and I had cooked. She took the lead so there were a lot of Sokovian and Romany dishes, as well as some very American sides like Mac and Cheese just in case the kids were being fussy.

Thor sat with Riley in his lap as Steve put Pietro in his highchair. "This is Riley's highchair," Steve said indicating to the other chair. "If you don't want her wiping her sticky fingers on you while you eat."

"Am I not meant to be a napkin?" Thor joked.

Steve chuckled. "You can be if you like. But there are other options."

"I'm sure she will love using you as a napkin." I teased.

"I would assume so," Thor said as Riley buried her face into his neck and started kicking her legs.

Wanda and I put a variety of foods into the kid's bowls and then sat and began helping ourselves.

"Now, Natasha," I said when everyone had started eating. "There's something you need to come to terms with."

"What'd I do?" She asked.

"Well, see... here's the thing," I said, putting my fork down and looking at her. "Out here at the compound, we can go outside with the kids and play or do whatever and we're left alone because the worst case it's just agents around, but generally the house is isolated. If we go back to the tower, the only way the kids can get to play outside is to go to the park, which means..."

"No," Nat said, firmly. "Nope. No. Nuh-uh."

"They have to be able to go outside and play, Nat," Sam said.

"No." She repeated, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Nat, they have to. Taking out the psychological need children have to do that. They need vitamin d to live." I said.

"They can play on the roof," Natasha said. "You said you could make a garden for them to play in, right, Tony?"

"Yeah. I can do that, but Nat, you can't ..." Tony started.

"Three years!" Natasha almost shouted. "I have saved them from those monsters for three years!"

"I know you have, Natasha," I said. "You've done a great job. But every year you do it their world becomes smaller. They can't just exist in a bubble where there are no other parts of the world. They should be able to go to the beach or Disney or the park with their dog. The longer we keep them from that the less chance they have of actually being normal kids who can interact with society. They will grow to resent us for what we kept from them. I know it sucks... but we have to figure out a way we can navigate in the actual world that negates the damage."

Natasha scowled and muttered something in Russian as Clint rubbed her back. She let out a breath and gave a slight nod. "They need to respect their boundaries, or so help me..."

"Luckily we have someone here who grew up with it and might have some ideas," Steve said.

"We could take out restraining orders. Happy was always pretty good at keeping them out of shot of me. I'll talk to him. Maybe they can have a team that just stays out of sight and sweeps around." Tony said.

"That's a start," Steve said. "We'll work this out, Natasha, but El is right, as much as we want to protect them, they can't live in a bubble."

"I want to keep them in a bubble," Natasha muttered. "I mean it though, I'll kill them if they get too close to my babies."

"Mama!" Pietro scolded, scrunching up his nose. "Don't be naughty."

Natasha laughed so hard she snorted. "Sorry, bud."