Yelena loves her sister more than anything, well, maybe not as much as Fanny, but she loves her a lot.
Natasha took Yelena under her wing after they took down the red room. She helped free the other widows, and then they were gonna part ways, but Natasha knew Yelena didn't have a home to go back to- Yelena made it abundantly clear to Nat that she didn't want to go home with Alexei. So, Natasha opened her arms and her home to Yelena.
The Avengers welcomed her with open arms, no one made any comments on how quiet she was for a while. They never questioned it when Yelena would flinch when they came too close to her. They never questioned it when she would run out of a room, mid panic attack. They especially never questioned it when she would curl up into Natasha's lap and stick her face into her neck. Tony said something about that once, and then found his suit dismembered later that night, and also a very threatening speech from Nat.
The Avengers made sure to let Yelena know that she has a family with them, always.
Anyways, over the last few months, Yelena has learnt a lot about her sister. She learnt that all the Avengers respect her a lot. She learnt that Natasha loves James Bond, she learnt that she loves peanut butter sandwiches, she learnt that she was a very early riser, but on Sundays she likes to lay in. She learnt that Natasha has an enormous- but secret- hoodie collection, Yelena may or may not stolen a few...or like half of them, and she learnt that Natasha pretends not to notice when Yelena stuffs one of her hoodies under her shirt and rushes out of the room.
But the biggest thing Yelena learnt about Natasha is, that she can't cook to save her life.
Seriously, Yelena has never met anyone so bad at cooking before.
She can still remember the first time Natasha cooked for her.
Flashback
Yelena grumbles as she searches through the cupboards for something to snack on. She learnt that she doesn't really eat meals, but she just snacks during the day on small things. She's still adjusting to life outside of the red room, they were only allowed one meal a day, and that was always plain foods.
You can picture the shock on her face when one day Wanda served her a plate of sokovian food, that definitely wasn't plain.
Yelena hadn't known what to do at the time. Whenever they were given food in the red room when it wasn't dinner, it was always a test, one that many failed because they were so hungry. Yelena just started blankly up at Wanda, her face paling. What was she doing?
"I haven't seen you eat in a while, so I made some food. Here," Wanda said politely with a smile.
Yelena's lip trembled, but thankfully Natasha had been in the room, so she was quick to help her sister.
Natasha stood up and took the plate from Wanda with a smile. "Thanks, Wands."
"Anytime." The witch replied happily before she left.
"Lena, this isn't the red room, Wanda isn't testing you. She's just a really nice person and she likes to cook. It's okay to eat it, I promise." Natasha told her.
Yelena glanced down at the food, and then up at her sister again. Natasha understood what she needed, so she grabbed the fork and put some food on there before eating it, proving to Yelena that it wasn't poisoned.
She felt more relaxed after that and allowed Natasha to feed her small amounts.
After that incident, Natasha helped Yelena get better with her eating, by cooking for her.
The first meal she made her was spaghetti and sauce. A nice and simple meal, Yelena couldn't see what could go wrong. And then she tried it.
The pasta was overly salted, not cooked all the way, and it practically crunched in her mouth. The sauce was cold, lumpy and there was way too much pepper in it.
But, the way Natasha was staring at her nervously, she knew she couldn't break her heart.
"Mmm, it's really good." Yelena says and forces herself to swallow the food, covering up her grimace with a smile.
Natasha's eyes lighten up and she smiles, proud of herself. "Well, you better eat up then, little one."
Yelena looks down at the plate of food and then back home at Natasha. "What about you?"
"Oh, don't worry about me, I've already eaten." Natasha reassures. "Eat up, it'll go cold."
Yelena holds back her groans of disgust as she chows down the food as quick as she could, trying to get it over and done with.
By the time Natasha had turned around from washing the dishes, Yelena had finished and was chugging a bottle of water.
"Jesus, Lena, you must of been hungry." Natasha teases. "Do you want some more?"
"No!" Yelena quickly replies. "I mean, no thank you, Nat, I'm full. But, thanks for cooking for me. I really appreciate it." She says and kisses her cheek.
Natasha smiles and ruffles her hair. "You're welcome."
Yelena smiles back before walking out of the room. When she's out of Natasha's sight, she sprints for the toilet, covering her mouth with her hand.
She managed to get to the toilet in time, just as everything she ate came back up.
"Sweetheart, are you okay?"
It was Wanda. Thankfully.
"Natasha cooked." Is all Yelena croaks out to make Wanda grimace.
"Oh, you poor thing." Wanda says sympathetically. "Why didn't you just tell her it was bad?"
"Because she looked so proud of herself, I didn't want to take that away from her." Yelena groans and flushes the toilet before brushing her teeth.
Wanda stays, just stroking her hair. "It's bad, huh?"
"So bad, I think I'd rather go back to the red room." Yelena whimpers and spits the toothpaste into the sink, rinsing it and putting her toothbrush back.
Wanda chuckles. "Wanna go for a pizza?"
End Flashback
"Ms Romanoff is requesting your presence in the kitchen, little widow." Friday announces which makes Yelena roll her eye at the name Tony gave her.
She tosses her book to the side and makes her way to the kitchen, raising an eyebrow at the smug look sat on Clint's face.
"Hey! I made lunch!" Natasha says happily and glances at her.
Yelena's face drops. "Oh." She whispers.
"Enjoy." Clint smirks at her which makes her flip him off.
"Shut it, bird boy." She grumbles.
"What was that, Lena?" Natasha asks with a smile and looks over at her.
"Um, what did you make?" She asks with a fake smile.
"Chicken and Mexican rice." Natasha replies and walks over with three plates which makes Clint's face drop.
"You made me a plate?" He asks.
"Someone has to feed you." Natasha replies and sets his plate down in front of him.
Yelena smirks at him and takes her own seat.
"There you go, detka." Natasha grins and puts Yelena's plate down.
Yelena looks down at the food. "Thanks, Nat." She says with a bright, but fake, smile.
Natasha ruffles her hair and puts her own plate down. "I'll grab some drinks." She says before leaving the room.
Yelena and Clint's faces drop as they poke at the hard chicken, that hasn't been seasoned at all.
"You try it first." Yelena whisper yells.
"No way. Why do I have to?" He asks.
"Because I'm too pretty to die." Yelena quips.
"So am I!" He cries out.
"Oh, honey," Yelena cringes and shakes her head which makes him glare at her.
Their fake smiles reappear and they sit up when Natasha re-enters the room with three bottles of juice. She hands them out before sitting down and lovingly gazing at Yelena.
Yelena sighs and picks her cutlery up, cutting into the chicken. She glances at Clint subtly when she sees it's still pink inside, meaning it's not cooked properly.
This is much less cool way to die
Yelena thinks to herself.
She meets Natasha's gaze to see her waiting her reaction, her gaze soft. Natasha loves cooking for Yelena, it makes her proud to supply for her baby sister after so many years of not being there for her.
Yelena slowly brings the fork up to her mouth and bites the chicken into her mouth. She manages to cover her grimace with another fake smile, tears of disgust filling her eyes.
"It's so good." Yelena mumbles around the chicken as she forces herself to chew it.
Natasha grins at the praise and turns to Clint. The man also sighs and brings a forkful of rice up to his lips, trying not to grimace as the overly salted and undercooked rice fills his mouth. It crunches as he chews on it.
"Nat, this is really good. I don't know how you do it." He croaks out after swallowing the rice.
"Really? It's really simple to make, I can do it again." Natasha tells her sister before cutting into her own chicken.
She freezes when she sees it's still pink, her gaze instantly jumps over to Yelena's cut chicken to see it's also pink.
She jumps up, grabbing a napkin and holding it under her sisters chin. "Spit it out. It's raw." She demands.
Yelena shakes her head, the chicken still sitting in her mouth. "No. It's good." She grimaces, tears of disgust falling down her cheeks.
"Yelena Belova." Natasha says sternly. "Spit it out!"
Yelena opens her mouth and lets the chicken fall onto the napkin. She snatches her juice bottle and chugs the whole thing as Natasha wipes her cheeks clean of tears with a fresh napkin.
"Why didn't you tell me it was bad?" Natasha asks in shock.
"It wasn't that bad." Yelena says, trying to salvage her sisters feelings.
"Lena, you just ate raw chicken." Natasha says softly.
"I didn't want to hurt your feelings." Yelena admits. "I know how much you like cooking for me, and it would kill me if I told you."
"O, malysh." Natasha coos. "I'm a big girl, I can handle it."
Yelena looks up at her. "I know, but I didn't want to make you sad."
"You haven't made me sad." Natasha reassures. "...is it all my meals?"
Yelena nods slightly which makes Natasha sigh and sit down, defeated.
"Oh." She mumbles.
"But, it's the thought that matters the most to me." Yelena tells her. "So what you can't cook? You do a lot more to provide for me."
Natasha glances at her sadly. "I'm sorry."
"For what?" Yelena asks.
"For not being able to cook properly for you." Natasha mumbles.
Yelena smiles and takes her sisters hand. "It's okay, Wanda and I can give you lesson."
"You can cook?" Natasha asks, surprised.
"Yes, I'm Russian." Yelena teases which makes Natasha roll her eyes.
"Shut up." She huffs with a hint of a smile.
"You can't be perfect at everything, Natalia, you're not me." Yelena sighs dramatically.
Natasha laughs and pushes her sisters head away from her. "You're annoying."
"Ah, you love me." Yelena smirks and nudges her shoulder.
"Yeah, yeah. Sometimes." Natasha says playfully.
Yelena smiles softly. "Hey, Nat?"
"Yeah, little one?" Natasha answers softly and cups her cheek.
"Can we order a Chinese? I'm starving!" Yelena whines.
Natasha barks out a laugh and nods her head.
"Go on, brat." She chuckles.
Yelena kisses her cheek before skipping out of the room.
Natasha turns to Clint who is smiling at her.
"Shut it, Barton. I poisoned yours. Say goodbye to your kids." She snaps annoyedly which makes him laugh.
"Alright, Gordon." He says and laughs but stood when a knife flies by his head, landing in the wall. "What? Yeah, I'm coming! Someone's calling me." He lies and runs out of the room.
Natasha chucks the food away and cleans up before going to find Yelena. She finds her, cuddled up in her bed, in one of her hoodies, and a James Bond movie on the tv.
Yelena pats the space next to her with a grin. Natasha joins her on the bed and lets Yelena snuggle into her chest, pressing a kiss to her little sisters head once she gets settled.
"Thank you for trying, Talia." Yelena says and looks up at her.
Natasha kisses her forehead and strokes her jaw softly. "Always, moya malen'kaya sestra."