The snow dulled every sound like the silencer of a pistol; cushioning footfalls, dampening the sound of traffic, muffling the ramblings of ramblers. It made her meandering deathly silent, but the shock of her red hair stood out like blood on bone china.
Natasha was aware someone was stalking her like a shadow; in her peripherals she could see a silhouette in the snow. Or was it her paranoia haunting her again? Plaguing her with spectral likenesses to men?
Natasha had always learnt to trust her instincts; gut feelings existed for a reason after all.
Her gun rattled in its holster, tucked in the interior breast pocket of her trench coat; the infernal device slotted into sleek silk; much like her: a weapon in pretty packaging. The pressure of the revolver – old fashioned, just how she liked things; well respected, reliable – thumped against her chest like her heartbeat as footsteps jostled it. The clicks and clunks of the chamber and clips, sounded like reassurance.
She traced the bulge of the gun, taciturn, tactile; it would've been a message to any skilled eyes trained on her.
"She knows I'm following her Coulson... She must know," Clint hissed, picking at the hem of his sleeve, a nervous habit.
"Don't give her any more indication. There's nothing more obvious than murmuring to yourself..." Coulson's voice of wisdom transmitted wise words to him.
"Roger that, sir."
An American voice in a United Soviet State? Nothing was more obvious; it was like a bad stitch in the rich cultural tapestry.
Not wanting to lead the shade following her back to her seniors, she went around the houses before she returned to the rendezvous. It made the perfect excuse to peruse and procrastinate; she'd be back in the clutches of the KGB soon enough, why make it sooner?
Natasha departed from the passageways, flocking with the masses to the main street. The road was littered with potholes, and crammed with cars. The snow had been shifted towards the sidewalks, blackened slush, ploughed through by grimy tires and sprayed with exhaust fumes. A satisfying sloshing sound surrounded the road as cars passed by, sending the sludge splaying outwards.
Clouds still hung over the city, a bleak grey, like a roof; trapping the cold beneath, and closing off the sun. But the bite of the wind didn't bother her; she'd spent winters doing assault courses in shorts and a tank top; barefoot on blades of frosty grass.
Though she season to be jolly approached, no Christmas lights lit the city, any joy was stifled by the state. Any public expression of unity could mean trouble for their regime. Natasha tried to picture the place with celebrative strings of lights, but somehow failed: Christmas... How many decades had it been since she'd celebrated it? There was no spirit of giving except of that to the motherland, no spirit of togetherness besides that of soldiers, there was no spirit of celebration except for the evisceration of the enemy.
Small acts of rebellion were something Natasha had always favoured; passing by a bakery, she saw one of the bakers shooing a family away with a broom. They scattered like rats, then rushed into the dank and dark of a nearby alley; hoping the closed surroundings would shield them from the world.
It gave her an idea.
They weren't animals. She knew what it was to be treated like a lesser life form.
A bell tolled as she pushed through the glass door of the baker's shop, and she kicked the snow off her heels as she arrived on the doormat. Scents of cinnamon and baking bread were thick in the air, the smell of domesticity. The windows were clouded on the inside, beads of warm moisture running down – it made her fume to knew a few lived in excessive luxury whilst others suffered with nothing but the bad weather to keep them company.
"Can I help you, madam?" The fresh-faced lad, the same who had chased away the coop of people with a broom, asked.
She smiled at him, her lips lightly pursed with contempt. "I'll buy five loaves. Fresh out of the oven."
The boy's eyes lit up like Christmas had come early. He rushed off into the kitchen to attend to her order.
Clint reminisced from the outside of the building, leaning against the wall in the snow. Snowflakes gathered in his spiked hair, which started to go flaccid in the cold and the wet. Clint didn't have to read Hungarian to work out that the shop was a family business; the quirky and quaint signage was clue enough, and the selective clientele that didn't come with a big name brand.
Watching her receive the goods over the counter, Clint hot-footed it away. Completely conspicuously.
Carrying the warm bread, she rushed back to the family who had been basking in the warmth of the bakery, and handed them the coveted goods; murmuring incomprehensible things in Hungarian. Clint watched: doe-eyed, transfixed. She split it into parts and dished it out to the children and adults; it was dissonant with everything he'd been taught about the enemy; about the Soviets. They looked as if they were praying over her as she left the remaining food in the bag with them.
Natasha was just about to set off again, but the youngest and scrawniest of the pack threw himself at her, clinging to her leg. She went rigid, unsure how to react, but then melted into the gesture – she thought for a moment of how what she saw would never be hers. Little or plenty, she would never have a family. She ruffled his hair, and whispered something into his ear, and folded his fingers around a slip of paper.
Money.
With a kiss on his brow, she slipped away, the altruistic angel of Christmas with her Titian red hair.
Clint stopped spectating and got back to his work.
"Tailing her, sir..." He murmured into his collar.
"Well aware, Barton. Tracker, remember. But keep your distance," Coulson's voice was less clear, the signal broken up by the blizzard.
"Yes sir. Sorry sir," he added quickly, then mentally flagellated himself for speaking into his collar again. He crossed the street, deeming it a decent distance to spy from: not close enough to draw attention, but not so far he couldn't keep track of her. Not as if he'd lose her: she was the only pinprick of colour in the beige city.
Headlights glancing off the street, he followed her through the bright haze of head-on traffic and the storm of tooting horns. Cars zipped past between them, the road like the rushing Danube currently concealed by buildings; but he could see her over the brow of the vehicles.
In a brief exchange, she overpaid for a newspaper, receiving blessings from the vendor. She rolled the dense wedge of paper up and tucking it into her pocket, she continued on her way.
He watched her stop and scout out cafes, but as she went to cross the street she stopped dead in her tracks.
"Sir, sir, she's stopped. I don't know what-" Clint saw her turn and face his way, then she started strutting towards the crossing, still facing his direction. "Shit, shit, shit! She's headed my way..." His heart jumped into his throat, and he pivoted, looking for somewhere to dash and look busy.
Behind him, a shop; he clumsily threw himself through the door and into the interior. Looking around at the expensively clothed natives, he felt out of place.
The jewellery store caught Natasha's eyes, of course it did. The lights in the window were brighter than that of any in the street, and the gems were purer than any of her putrid surroundings. It wasn't the ornate necklaces, or the spangly bracelets, or even the brooches imbued with blood diamonds that caught her eye. It was the selection of rings.
Clint could see her face in the window, and could hear his pulse pumping in his ears. He plucked off his gloves and started prospecting the jewellery; the expensive array behind the counter.
"She's in the window!" He hissed. "Red altert! She is in the window!"
"Then stop talking to me, and look busy!" Coulson crackled right back.
The door clacked as it closed, and he saw the red head brush the snow off her shoulders and flick her hair so send snow scattering onto the polished floor.
Her heels clicked like an overture to his untimely undoing as she approached, and came and stood next to him. It was close enough to hear her quiet draws of breath. He pulled his best fascinated face.
Vying for Clint's attention, an attendant at the till asked Clint something in Hungarian, and he looked like a startled deer in the headlights.
"Tell me you at least learnt the most basic of phrases in Hungarian, Clint," Coulson asked, overhearing snippets of the conversation. "He was too busy ogling Agent Morse!" Came Maria's distant and disembodied voice.
Clint cleared his throat, pretending the words didn't rile him up. Then promptly answered the cashier: "Nem." He flapped a hand dismissively and shook his head casually – biting the inside of his cheek all the while. The 'No' was both to the employee and Agent Coulson listening back at HQ across the Atlantic.
He kept tabs on her out the corner of his eye and listened to her fluently flood the attendant's ears with Hungarian. And with some pointing and directing, the shop assistant went behind the counter and withdrew a ring from the cabinet behind.
She could see the man floundering to make conversation with the customer – all part of the service, Clint supposed; that was always his favourite part of working in a shop – but she remained stock still and silent. She uttered a single word as she thrust out her hand, and the man hesitantly slotted the ring onto her finger.
Natasha relished the press of the ring on her finger. It felt like Alexi's kiss on her hand. The gem was bright enough and fat enough to make the rest of the room seem dark; the way he used to appear to her. She tilted her hand in the light, watching the light refract through the faceted diamond set in eighteen-carat gold; just as precious as he once was. Owning such a pretty trinket made her feel important. Having anything her own made her feel important.
"Gyönyörű," Clint remarked, leaning to look over at the ring that overwhelmed her dainty hand. Beautiful.
"Trust you to know how to flirt in Hungarian..." Coulson said, exasperated. "Wait... Clint, who are you flirting with?"
"Igen," she replied, yes, admiring the flash of light as she tilted it, clearly meaning the ring.
"Nem, te..." Clint added; no, you, cosying up to her, and smirking.
And just as quickly as her heart filled with delight, it soured with shame. Her emerald green eyes – lucid enough to rival the stones set in the rings in the glass counter – met with his, and her blood red lips parted, quivering with hesitation.
The black widow was lost for words. She felt sick. "Elnézést," she murmured, excuse me, and removed the ring, throwing it down at the counter hard enough to leave a crack.
The customers all startled at the sound of the metal band fracturing the glass, then the bang of the door as she swept out.
"That was weird," Clint uttered under his breath, waiting for her to leave. "Was that not weird? What kind of a girl doesn't like being flirted with? And what kind of a girl tries on an engagement ring of her own accord?"
He could see her dabbing her eyes as she left, and quickly placed shades on her face; a contradiction to the grey weather, devoid of sunlight. She didn't want anyone seeing the mascara that started to smudge down her cheeks. Her bare hands furled into fists in the cold; how dare he?
She could never love again. She would never feel loveable again. What kind of an oaf flirts with a girl with an engagement ring on?
"Natasha Romanoff, apparently."
"Do some digging, Coulson. I'll get back on her scent. Besides aiding beggars, buying newspapers and trying on rings, time to see what makes Miss Romanoff tick."
A/N - Sorry it's been so long. My life schedule has been overwhelmed. Acting in the Shakespeare for Schools Festival, attending lectures and conferences for 'English' and 'Philosphy of Religion' that dragged me all over the country, and being weighed down with the workload.
It's here finally. A chapter. And hey! It's almost Christmas. Sorry I missed Thanksgiving (even though as a Brit, I don't celebrate it) - but what were you thankful for?
I hope it was worth the wait! Thanks for your patience!